


with your hand in mine

by Aykayencee



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blind Kakashi, Disability, Eventual KakaObi, I swear, Idiots in Love, M/M, Major Character Injury, Recovery, Slow Burn, Team Bonding, Team Minato era
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-08-21
Packaged: 2020-03-17 19:47:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18971836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aykayencee/pseuds/Aykayencee
Summary: Mission success. Kannabi Bridge is destroyed; the war is ending. All three members of Team Minato return, but not quite whole.If nothing else, they're there for each other.//Canon-Divergence AU, where things are better, though not without a price.





	1. Obito

Surprisingly, it’s Obito who wakes first. His injuries are worse, his surgeries more complex, his chances of recovery lower, but three days after they’re brought back from Kannabi Bridge, his eyes, not Kakashi’s, are the ones that blink open.

Any other time, he would have savoured the miniscule win, lorded it over Kakashi’s head for as long as he could, but really, he can barely form a coherent thought. Everything feels fuzzy, so much so that he can’t tell if he’s lying on the ground or on a bed or sinking into water, and he feels so weak that it takes a few minutes for him to muster up the strength to open his eyes.

When he manages to, he blinks groggily against the sunlight filtering in through the curtains. It’s too bright and paints the walls a stark white, but he doesn’t have the mental capacity to realise that he can just close his eyes again. He barely has enough to figure out where he is, despite how often he ends up here.

_Hospital._

Everything is sticky and gross, painful, or both. It feels like he’s been out for days, and, well, he wouldn’t expect anyone to stay around watching him for that long, so he tries to call out, hopefully alert a nurse who can catch him up on what’s happened. He’s not quite sure how intelligible it was, but he must have gotten something out, because he blinks and a mop of yellow is covering his vision, an anxious face hovering just inches above his.

Not a nurse, but better than one.

“Minato,” he says, throaty and dry. It gives him a certain warmth that Minato is still here, waiting for him, especially if he really had been unconscious for days. The comfort of the familiar face is enough. He doesn’t need to know all the _whats_ and _whys_ and _hows._ He doesn’t really want to know. He wants to stay still, do nothing, and think nothing, just for a little while.

It's uncharacteristic of him, but Minato seems to understand anyways, because he holds still for a moment before he shifts out of view. There’s the sound of a chair dragging against the floor, then his hand is resting against Obito's forehead. Even after that, he doesn't speak. He spends another moment brushing Obito's bangs away from his face and draws in a long breath before saying anything.

"Everything will be fine, Obito."

Obito does his best to give his teacher a smile.

There's a beat of silence, then sudden shuffling as Minato scrambles back to his feet. "Water," he says, already having reached behind Obito to help him sit so he can drink.

Obito lets out a little yelp. He feels a bit of shame because squealing at pain isn’t really in the image of a stoic shinobi, but the motion _hurts_. He’s had worse, though, so he quashes down any other reaction and does his best to sip at the glass of water that’s been pressed to his lips. The cold burns his throat going down, but in a pleasant way. He feels more awake and aware immediately, and he manages to swallow down the entire cup.

When Minato pulls it away and sets Obito back down on the bed, he twists his head and finds the willpower to look him in the eye. “What happened?”

“The mission didn’t go as planned,” Minatos says. “Bad intel. But you completed the mission and everyone is safe.”  
  
“Oh.” Obito doesn’t remember any of that. His memory drops off at a cave, trying to fight off enemy shinobi after having rescued Rin. They must have won, then. That was a reassuring thought. “Rin and Kakashi?” he asks, the focus he had before already slipping.

“Beside you,” Minato replies, the corner of his lips quirking upwards as he pointed. “And Rin’s at home, resting. You’ve been here for days.”

Obito’s turning to follow the direction of Minato’s finger as soon as he made the gesture, almost too distracted to register the latter half of the response.

“He’ll be fine,” sounds from behind him. And Kakashi does look fine. Unconscious and a tad pale, several IVs clearly visible, but fine. “Chakra exhaustion. We found him collapsed by the bridge; he must have burned through his reserves destroying it after fighting off the guards.”  
  
Huh. So even after being convinced by his power of friendship speech, the bastard had abandoned Rin and him to complete the job. Figures.

But, something didn’t feel quite right. The brunt of the fatigue from chakra exhaustion was supposed to last a couple days at most. Even if the victim was largely immobile afterwards, they should at least have woken. He had seen it himself - once, a year or so ago, Kakashi had landed himself in a similar state, and had been awake after a day and standing after two. “...It’s pretty severe, I guess,” he says, confusion evident.

The pause before Minato’s reply is also telltale.

“...It can vary, depending on the person and situation,” he says, not quite explanatory, like he needs to convince himself. “I’m sure he’ll be fine. He’s being monitored.

Obito lets out a puff of breath still staring at Kakashi. The blankets are pulled all the way up, over his shoulders, so he can’t see the hospital gown underneath. The cloth mask is missing, but there’s a surgical mask over his face instead, and it’s still blue albeit a light one, so if he squints a bit, everything seems normal. It’ll be fine.

He turns his attention back to Minato and tries to push away the unease tugging at his chest.

* * *

The next time he wakes up, the better part of two days has passed. The sleep must have done some good, because he already feels awake and attentive enough to return to active duty. He’s itching to get up and move, go for a run, do some training. He’s not allowed to, of course, but he’s bored enough to close his eyes and imagine in hopes that it’ll be enough to satiate the energy in his bones.

Or, lack thereof.

What is brain is telling him is not what’s actually going on with his body, apparently, because Konoha’s medical techniques are advanced enough that the pain he should be feeling is almost all erased.

Unfortunately, that did little to help with any actual functionality, and his legs don’t have the strength to let him stand. He’s told that they were crushed under a rockslide, and though Rin’s immediately treatment and the skill of their surgeons will allow him to regain most motion, it’ll take time.

Patience has never really been one of his strong suits, though, so in between Minato and Rins’ visits, he rolls around on the bed, counting the seconds as they tick by at a snail’s pace, and stares at Kakashi.

Only because there's nothing better to do, of course. He's not concerned. Not concerned.

He still hasn’t woken yet. Minato’s concerned, the nurses are concerned, and okay, maybe he’s more concerned than he’s willing to admit. Although, with everyone else’s worry around him, maybe he’s reached the point where panic would be a better descriptor.

Also not helping is watching a doctor hover around Kakashi, looking flummoxed and muttering to himself as he checks monitors here and adjusts tubes there. Particularly frightening tidbits include, “ _chakra levels are fine_ ” and “ _should have woken up days ago_ ”.

Somewhere in the middle of that, a nurse arrives and pulls Obito out for rehab. He’s excited at first, as he’s wheeled down the halls, thinking that they’re going to let him do anything at all to quell his boredom, thinking that a bit of exercise will be a good distraction.

Instead he’s just laid down on a mat and made to do a whole bunch of stretches that would have been too easy even in his academy days, all while the double-bars a couple meters away taunt him. He’s not sure if he can really call it easy right now — he’s making barely any of the motions himself — but he still feels sore and exhausted when he finishes an hour later, and he’s all too eager to be lifted back into the bed to rest.

Once he is, he rolls over to face Kakashi again out of habit.

He’s gone.

Obito falls asleep before he can figure out what that means.

* * *

Rin visits. Apparently, she’s tried to come a bunch of times already but he’s been asleep for each one. The thought of that makes his heart bubble a bit, but that doesn’t last long because he can see from Minato’s expression that something’s wrong.

“Kakashi,” they both say at the same time, voices equally hoarse.

They cut off together as well, eyes locked into each others’ as Rin presses herself to the wall.

Minato’s the one with information to explain, so he breaks the silence. Still, his words trembled. “He was poisoned. It’s a subtle one, and its effects were slow, so nobody noticed anything was wrong, until his heart stopped-”

Obito’s breath catches in his throat.

“-but he’s okay, right now. There was someone with lightning release and they rescusitated him.” No part of that really makes things any better, and he’s still haunted by what could have been, but Minato continues. “The poison is being filtered out now that they’ve caught it, but there’s no antidote, so it’s only seals which will take some time. But…”

Minato pauses again. Obito just wants him to hurry up, but he also doesn’t really want to hear it, like not knowing would make it not real.

“Even when the poison itself is gone, the some of the damage it’s done will most likely be permanent. It looked to be attacking his nervous system, considering the effects, but I really don’t know what the effects are, or how bad they’ll be. So, Obito. No matter what happens, please be kind to him, alright? We’re a team.”

Obito nods mutely. They had just made their first step, just saw that maybe there could be something great between them. There was no way it could end so fast.

“Let’s hope for the best.”  
  
Obito looks up and smiles, realising that he’s still mirroring Minato. It’s genuine. Maybe he had forgotten for a moment, thanks to the somber mood and all the doom and gloom, but this is Kakashi. The idiot’s too stubborn to lose to poison of all things. It’ll be fine.

They remain in an awkward silence for bit longer before Rin finally breaches it, asking Obito what he’s been up to and promising to sneak him some dango next time she comes. Minato chuckles but otherwise pretends not to hear.

According to Minato, the war is cooling to an end. With Kannabi Bridge gone, Iwa and Kusa are quickly being starved of supplies, and Suna doesn’t do anything with its allies so heavily weakened. It’s only a matter of time before treaties start being written and signed.

Because of that, there’s no desperate need for every able shinobi to be active, so Rin has been able to stay in the village and train. Usually alone, because Minato doesn’t really have much time in between the frontlines and paperwork, but then again, the rest is already a blessing.

It doesn’t take long for them to stray to more whimsical conversation: talks about pushing back the academy graduation limits, a nice restaurant Rin went to, something particularly entertaining that Gai did. It’s not until the sun’s almost completely set that a nurse comes and kicks Minato and Rin out for being loud enough to disturb pretty much everyone in the hospital, and when they leave and Obito closes his eyes to sleep, it’s with a satisfied grin on his face.

Everything is almost perfect. Everything, except…

Obito glances at the empty bed next to him.

* * *

Like when he disappeared, it’s when Obito returns from rehab (double bars, finally, though for all his excitement he had only managed a pass and a half before collapsing) that he finds Kakashi has miraculously reappeared. It’s been another few days, and he looks much worse for wear than he had before. His skin is almost as pale as his hair, and he looks scrawny and frail even when covered by the blankets. No surgical mask this time, because there’s an oxygen mask over his face instead that does a fine job of hiding it. And of providing oxygen, which Obito figures is the more important part.

“He should wake soon. The poison’s all gone.”

Obito turns to see Minato sitting in the guest chair again, eyes still fixated on a scroll. He must be really overloaded to be working even during a hospital visit.

He still doesn’t look up as Obito returns to his bed. On his own for the first time, mind you, and with just a bit of support from the nurse he makes the two steps from the wheelchair to the bed without falling on his face.

Once he’s scooted into a comfortable position, leaning against the headboard, Minato rolls up his scroll. “How are you?”

“Kakashi.”

Minato laughs. “Last I saw, you two were at each others’ throats. You’ve got to tell me what happened in between then and now, or I’ll be stuck under the impression that you got captured and replaced by spies disguised as you.”

Obito glares.  
  
“There really isn’t much more I can tell you. The poison’s gone, so he should wake up soon.”

As if on cue, Kakashi’s eyes snap open.


	2. Minato

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I spent like an hour trying to figure out the ages and nothing is consistent, so in lieu of driving myself insane, I’m just going to average out the conflicting info and say that Kakashi is 11 and Obito and Rin are 14. Definitely not accurate, hopefully doesn’t bother anyone!

Kakashi doesn't flail, or even tense. The only sign that he’s awake, other than the opening of his eyes, is a subtle pulse of chakra as he reaches out to to scan his surroundings. The results of years of training kicking in, instinctively keeping himself unnoticed until he can figure out the situation and the best plan of action.

Fortunately, it’s not necessary, right now.

Minato scrambles to kneel at Kakashi’s bedside, flashes a hand signal behind his back telling Obito to stay put, and takes his hand in an attempt to comfort him. “Relax, Kakashi,” he says. “You’re just in Konoha Hospital.”

And, well, Kakashi was never outwardly panicked enough to be able to visibly calm down, but other than a twitch of his hand, he doesn’t make any motion of resistance against Minato.

He does try to talk, though. His attempt is ruined by the oxygen mask, but it fogs up as he fights against it and Minato takes the signal to remove it. He’s seen Kakashi’s face before, and his body is blocking it from Obito’s view, but he realises that it was still a bad idea. Without the help, Kakashi’s breaths are forced and weak, the exertion it takes to drag air in and out of his lungs evident. 

“Minato-sensei,” he rasps, eventually. He speaks slowly, like he’s having trouble shaping his tongue. “M-mission report?”

Discussing a mission not even a minute since he’s woken up seems so tactless, but also so Kakashi. 

Minato almost chides him, the words telling Kakashi to slow down and take things one step at a time dying at the tip of his tongue, because he realises that the only thing that will actually help settle him is to give a direct answer.

“Mission success,” he says, using a tone that’s warm and soft rather than the emotionless neutrality standard for mission reports. It’s a compromise, sort of, but he’s really just doing what he thinks will be best for his student. “Kannabi Bridge is gone, but I found you unconscious at the cliffside. Rin is at home right now and Obito's next to you." He pauses as he realises that his positioning makes him sound crazy because Kakashi won't be able to see Obito with him in the way.

"Er, behind me, right now. Sorry, I didn't think you would want him to see your face. How do you feel?"

It takes Kakashi a while to reply, maybe because he doesn't know what to say, maybe because he physically can't say it. Whichever it is, Minato gives him time.

"Bad," is all Kakashi offers at first, clumsy and uncertain. "Um, fuzzy and heavy. Like I haven’t really woken up yet."

He stops and Minato feels relief, thinking that's all, but then, in a rush, Kakashi says, "I can't see,” and his heart drops. There’s a poorly-stifled sound behind him, and Minato whips around to fix Obito with a glare, and mouths at him to stay quiet.

By the time he looks back, Kakashi’s composure has completely melted away. His eyes squeeze shut again, and his hand shakes. Minato is reminded, painfully, that he’s eleven. He may be able to take care of himself as an adult does, handle jobs and lead teams as an adult does, but inside, he isn’t one. No matter how much their laws may insist otherwise, Kakashi is a child, lost and scared, and it’s Minato’s job as his mentor to comfort him. 

“Deep breaths, Kakashi. Ten seconds in, ten seconds out. I’ll make sure that everything will be alright. I’ll make sure of it.” Even as he speaks, anxiety twists in Minato’s gut, the explanations of “ _ side-effects _ ” and “ _ permanent damage _ ” ringing in his head. He had been the one who said to hope for the best, leaving the second half of the saying implied, but maybe he should have said it aloud, because he was not prepared for the worst. Like anything would’ve helped him be ready. He looks into the eyes, and realises that they’re not tired, or dazed. They’re glassy and unfocused, unfunctional.

Kakashi regains control frighteningly quickly. “Don’t hide things.” It sounds about as icy as a whisper can be. 

So Minato talks. He tells him what he’s pieced together about what happened on the mission, does his best to regurgitate what he’s been told about the poison, and then, mostly because he wants to end on a bright note, explains the war situation. Conspicuously, he avoids mentioning the permanence of the poison’s effects, filling the spaces with hollow reassurances instead.

Kakashi’s not stupid enough to fall for any of them.

He didn’t know that Kakashi would call him out on it so quickly, though he should have, considering how direct his student always was.

“I said not to lie.”

“I don’t know,” he says, and catches himself in the middle of doing exactly what he was told not to do, twice. “Not exactly. It might improve, marginally, but if it’s damaged your optic nerves to this extent it’s most likely permanent.”

Kakashi doesn’t reply, and Minato wonders if it’s because he already knew the truth and just wanted to hear it, spoken, as confirmation so that he wouldn’t have to vacillate in and out of hope.

“So it’s permanent,” he says, and Minato’s suspicions are confirmed. Kakashi would rather be given a hard no than risk disappointment. 

“You’re tired right now,” Minato says, an absolute non-sequitur. “Your body was pushed to the brink. I think you should get some more rest. I’ll notify someone that you’ve woken later.”

“No,” Kakashi hisses. He tries to sit up, but his arms are awkward and trembling. He barely pushes himself an inch up before he collapses, chest heaving.

Minato puts his hand over Kakashi’s chest to prevent him from trying again. The rise and fall is barely present under his fingers despite how he’s obviously straining, and the weakness of it frightens him. “Don’t force anything, Kakashi. You’ll hurt yourself. Be patient and wait until you’ve regained some strength.”

No response. 

“I’m going to replace the breathing mask. Listen to me and sleep, okay?”

“W-what? No, I just got up, I have to- to start training-”

He doesn’t manage to actually move, but Minato feels a bit of resistance under his palm. “You will not. After you’ve recovered, I’ll train with you myself until you’ve surpassed the level you were at before. But right now-” Minato fixes the mask back on, effectively stopping any more protests. “I want you to rest.”

Kakashi’s breathing evens out immediately. It’s probably because of the oxygen mask, but his eyes slide shut and don’t open again. Minato stays still for a few more minutes, head down and still holding his hand, until he hears a tentative “Sensei?” from behind himself. He releases his grip and stands.   


“Okay,” he says, to himself more than Obito. “Okay, okay.” He turns, finally acknowledging his other student.

He looks worried, not at all impatient. For all his brashness and how easy he is to anger, Obito has impressive emotional maturity for his age. Maybe it’s because he is so volatile - he understands others because he’s open and accepting with himself. Interesting, how the two boys, both alone and ostracized, had ended up so different.

“We’re a team, so we’ll do it together, right?” 

He’s parroting the sentiment that Minato had given a few days ago, but it’s enough to encourage Minato to lift his head. 

Try as he might, he can’t figure out anything to add. Neither of them can, really. There’s nothing to say that could make the situation any better. 

But, that’s good in a way. Minato won’t have to talk to Obito about how to behave, because he obviously already knows. He had really been dreading that, because there’s no good way to have a conversation about how to treat your teammate when he’s injured and on the brink of losing his career before he’s hit his teens. Actually, there’s no good way to deal with that in general. The knowledge that Obito will to do his part is reassuring, at least.

“I’m going to work extra hard,” Obito continued, plowing on despite Minato’s silence. “I’m gonna do double the laps I did yesterday, and pay attention to the stretches, and work until I can’t and then do even more.”

If Minato had chosen to ask how that was related, Obito wouldn’t have been able to answer. He doesn’t, though. Whatever the nebulous reasoning is, it’s lit a fire in him, to push more and do better. It’s for the sake of Kakashi, probably. Somehow.

The silver lining is so thin it may as well be a line of discoloured thread.

“You heard what I told Kakashi earlier,” Minato hears himself say. It’s stern but well meaning. “I don’t want either of you overexerting yourselves.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Obito says, with a cheeky smile. “I’m just going to take this chance to get ahead of Bakakashi.

It’s fake as anything, even Obito’s smile, but Minato grins back. “That’s the spirit. I know you two will always support each other, in the end.”

* * *

Kakashi’s first checkup with a doctor is in the afternoon a day later. Obito is out of the room, doing his own therapy. Minato figures that it’s intentional, to give Kakashi more privacy without the hassle of moving him to another room.

It’s not invasive, really. There’s some prodding here and there, testing muscles and then reflexes. They test his breathing, with the mask then without, and then ask him to try and lift his arm, hold a pencil. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Despite that, Kakashi is deeply uncomfortable. Maybe it’s not as clear to the doctor, because he doesn’t know Kakashi so personally, but Minato can see it in how he hesitates, how his hand clenches around the sheets, how he trembles.

Well, maybe not the last one, because they seem to be uncontrollable and continuous. 

It’s bad.

His responses are delayed, he barely has the strength to move his limbs, and his hands aren’t dexterous enough to wrap around the pencil, much less keep it grasped. The doctor doesn’t even feel safe letting Kakashi go extended periods of time without the oxygen mask, because he’s not intaking enough on his own. “Yet,” he had said. “I’m confident that you can regain this, as well as most of your motor skills.”

That had made Minato feel a bit better, but clearly not Kakashi. He had been despondent, giving a short nod and looking like he didn’t believe anything he was being told, like he had long since given up. 

Minato doesn’t blame him. False hope can be worse than no hope at all, and Kakashi has been bitten by life enough times that he knows better than to trust it. 

He believes, though. He’ll believe enough for the both of them, and then some, with the help of Obito and Rin. 

Then, the doctor mentions that he has to do a vision test as well. He says it’s a bit of a hassle, but the conclusion is reached in less than a minute.

Some of Minato’s belief washes away. More than he’d like to admit, actually.

When the light is shone into each eye, neither reacts. They remain blown, the dark pupils permanently dilated to the point that it’s morbid to look at. The aimless glaze in them isn’t just an illusion.

The doctor is quick to admit that there isn’t much he can do. He offers some platitudes instead, promises to be back for another check-up tomorrow, and leaves Minato to sit by the bedside in silence.

* * *

Too coincidentally, Kakashi happens to be asleep every time Obito’s conscious and in their shared hospital room. Of course, it helps that Obito’s rehab and allowed training time has been increased drastically, but having perfect timing for days in a row is a little hard to believe. It also doesn’t help that Minato knows he’s been improving, being able to stay up for longer each time he wakes before falling into unreachable pits of slumber the moment Obito returns.

He understands that Kakashi doesn’t want to face Obito. He already hates his daily examinations. No matter what the results are, it’s torture to him. It’d just be worse with someone he knows. Kakashi hasn’t been voiceless about things because he’s accepting; he’s been voiceless because he doesn’t even know how to process it. He isn’t ready to talk, and he doesn’t realise that Obito has the tact to skirt around and focus on other things.

But, Obito’s taking it hard. He had charged himself up, gotten all hung-ho with his intention to take care of Kakashi, and then run head first into the immovable wall that was his teammate. He was still trying his best, focusing on his own recovery as he puzzled over a way to get past, but the roadblock had left him lost and reeling. Because, he’s not stupid, no matter what his actions say. He knows that Kakashi’s avoiding him on purpose. 

Maybe, if he really wanted to, he could force his way through, but he doesn’t have the courage to force it when every sign is saying that’s the opposite of what Kakashi wants.

That’s why Minato is so surprised when Obito appears in the doorway, leaning heavily on crutches but with a determined grin. 

Then, he sees Kakashi, propped up against a pillow. He’s breathing as hard as he can into a little device to measure the strength of his lungs as a doctor listens with a stethoscope. 

The grin falls, and at the same time, his eyes widen, his breath hitches, and he takes a step backwards. He was always one to wear his heart on his sleeve, and his reaction hides nothing, especially not from Minato, who knows him like the back of his own hands. 

For all he had talked himself up, rehearsed and prepared for this moment, Obito is not ready.

He tucks himself back around the bend, out of sight in the room. 

Minato has noticed him, the doctor hasn’t. Kakashi definitely has as well, but he hasn’t reacted.

The old Kakashi would have called Obito out. He always did. Obito was poor at stealth, Kakashi was not poor at sensing, and he especially was not poor at berating Obito. Pointing out his hiding locations with scathing derision was a common occurrence, nearly as frequent as rebuking him for being late.

This one does not.

He finishes the exercise and lets the doctor clasp the breathing mask back on, obviously worn out. The doctor talks, and he seems to listen but his expression remains impassive, even though it’s good news.

Minato had expected that progress would help Kakashi, but after having days worth of consistent improvement fail to affect the boy’s outlook, he’s starting to rethink that. 

He knows why. These minute improvements don’t matter to him. Kakashi is, at his core, a soldier, and that is all he wants to be. The promise of being free of the breathing mask soon doesn’t matter to him. The threshold is between “being able to be a shinobi”, and “not being able to be a shinobi”. No matter how drastic the changes are, they aren’t enough to cross that line.

Anyways. The doctor is gone now, and as it is after every session, the atmosphere is somehow worse than it was before. 

It’s a coward’s move, but Minato says, “I think you’ve got a visitor,” into Kakashi’s ear. “I’ll go get him and be back in a moment.”

But that’s not entirely true. Even if it does serve the purpose of granting Minato a moment’s reprieve and bringing in someone else to share his load, there’s more to it. Obito has worked up the courage to initiate the encounter, and it’s the least Minato can do to give him the extra push he needs. Or, put more kindly, offer a hand to guide him towards his goal. 

“Obito?” he says, as he peers around the the edge of the doorframe, to find, as expected, his student pressed against the wall and looking thoroughly miserable.

He’s planned a little speech, a lecture on determination and encouragement that he hopes will give Obito the confidence he needs. Something about how when someone else is down, you have to stand up in their stead then reach to help them up, how they need each other more than ever right now, so the leap has to be taken.

It gives him a flutter of pride that it turns out to be unnecessary.

Obito glances up, lower lip trembling, but his eyes are dry. He doesn’t say anything, instead pushing himself upright so he can hobble around Minato and into Kakashi’s room. 

Well, it’s his room, too, but there’s no arguing for who has the dominating presence right now. Minato brushes the thought aside and follows a half-step behind him, ready to catch him if he falls. 

In both senses of the phrase. 

He needs to, almost immediately. Obito is in recovery himself. Standing is still painful and tiring for him. 

So, when Obito stumbles, Minato grabs him by the forearms so that he can find his balance again, then pushes him to his bed to force him to sit. It’s already side-by-side with Kakashi’s and anyways, the room is small enough that a speaking voice can be heard from anywhere in the room.

He takes the crutches so that he can lean them against the wall by the bed, out of the way but within arm’s reach, and then sits in the visitor’s chair and waits. 

“Kakashi,” he says. Then, something sparks in him. “You really are an idiot, Bakakashi.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! As a side note, I’m currently looking for a beta (or just someone to fangirl at, xD). If you’re interested, hit me up at [aykayencee.tumblr.com](https://aykayencee.tumblr.com/). Alternatively, yell at me for my mistakes in the comments. Either works!


	3. Kakashi

_“You really are an idiot, Bakakashi.”_

He does not feel anger, or even annoyance. And why should he? Obito had never been able to rile Kakashi up unless he let him. Not even when things go wrong and it’s his fault. There’s no reason for that to change now. Besides, Kakashi has been enduring the piercing burn of Obito’s eyes on him for days now. If anything, being outright spoken to is less provocative than that.

Sensei is probably watching from outside.

Actually, he definitely is, if the unmoving chakra presence outside is any indication.

Not that Kakashi’s going to give in just because of that.

He’s already talked to Minato, a little, in the first few days. Greetings. Dull affirmations to generic questions. Pretty much every way it was possible to say “I’m fine” without meaning it. Minato, being the caring teacher and responsible adult, had tried to breach the subject of feelings and recovery and that sort of bullshit. A cute little motivational speech about how roadblocks were inevitable and how sometimes, you couldn’t plow through them. How sometimes, you have to turn back and find a different path around. A promise to be right next to him and find that new path together.

Kakashi hadn’t responded to that. Hasn’t responded to anything since that, in fact.

His catatonic state is probably what's driven Obito to be more forward, what’s worrying Minato enough to make him push Obito to be more forward. He really doesn’t care. He can’t find the motivation to care. He can’t find the motivation to do much more than lie in his bed and let doctors and nurses do tests and exercises, handle his body for him.

He knows full well that he can’t do this forever.

Or, maybe he can, but he knows his devotion to the village won’t allow him to keep wasting its resources like this. He has to contribute, somehow, or at least, stop being a deadweight drain.

Eventually.

Eventually, because as much as he knows it’s inevitable, he doesn’t want to, nor can he muster up the will to force himself. What started as an intentional action had settled heavily onto him, confining and inescapable.

He tries to convince himself that it’s fine. He’s supposed to be resting, anyways, giving his body time to fix itself as best as it can. It’s kind of working. When he’s propped up, he can sit for a while without getting tired, and he’s pretty sure enough core strength has returned for him to sit unaided if he’s made to. There are suggestions that he can start trying to stand, soon.

The knowledge that in time, he’ll be back on his feet, both physically and metaphorically speaking, is not reassuring. It’s only a reminder of the duty he can’t fulfill.

From beside him, he hears a low, frustrated noise, Obito’s impatience on full display.

Well, look at that. He’s gotten under Obito skin again, without even trying, this time.

“Listen, Bakakashi. I don’t care if you won’t talk to me back. I’m just going to talk at you until something gets through your thick skull.”

Kakashi would never admit that his interest is piqued by the resolution in Obito’s voice, but that doesn’t matter anyways. He’s listening, but only because he physically can’t not listen.

“Okay, okay.” Obito takes a deep breath, apparently still having to calm his own nerves. “I know everything is really really bad, and I can’t say anything to make it not bad. And I know everyone also knows it’s bad and they’re trying to be nice while telling you your career’s done-”

_It is_ , Kakashi’s mind interjects drily, though he still refuses to speak. _Blind ninja aren’t ninja. They’re discharged and sent to do menial village work._ He knows that for a fact, because he’s already heard mutterings of when his case can officially be declared a loss. He knows that, had he not been a sightless, unresponsive eleven year-old, formal discharge papers would already have been shoved at him to fill out.

“-but I’m not gonna tell you that, because they’re all stupid!”

_Or maybe it’s just you who’s stupid, Obito._

As if he had heard Kakashi’s silent thought, Obito drops the mature act for the rashness that fits him so much better. “Geez, I can’t believe _I’m_ the one trying to give _you_ confidence. If anyone told me this’d happen I’d call them insane, you’re supposed to be stronger and smarter and everything. Not that you’d ever encourage me back, because you’re-” He cuts off, apparently thinking better of whatever he was going to say.

“You’re really good."

Kakashi waits for the follow-up, the “at being a jerk”, the “even though I’m better”.

It doesn’t come. 

“I-I know you’re not even listening to me right now, but in the Uchiha clan, there’s a myth about a blind shinobi, which is weird, because he was an Uchiha and Uchiha are supposed to really like their eyes, but if one of my old dead half-grandpas can do it, then I don’t see why you can’t! You’re better than shinobi four years older than you, at pretty much everything, because you learn stuff too fast and it sucks because we can’t keep up, so use your brain to figure this out instead of just- just lying there moping all day.”

Apparently, the vague concept of a children’s bedtime story is supposed to make Kakashi feel better. As is the even vaguer idea that there must be some solution that he has to think up himself, because Obito had clearly bulldozed off the tracks of his pre-planned speech.

If nothing else, his absolute inability to parse just the surface of even one of Kakashi’s many problems is sort of amusing. More than that, though, it’s frustrating and aggravating, bringing up all the things that Kakashi had swept away because he hadn’t wanted to think about them. Because he had thought about them, still was, really, and it was driving him insane.

In the first little while, he had tried, helped by Minato.

_“You’re a good chakra sensor already, with practice, you could be great, great enough to locate enemies without seeing.”_

Except, knowing where a person doesn’t mean much when they can hide their signature, or bait you with a false one. Knowing where their body is doesn’t tell you where their arm is, where their leg is, whether they’re holding a blade or whether they’ve already impaled you with it. Knowing they’re there doesn’t tell you their musculature, or what they’re carrying.

_“You can compensate for your new shortcomings, the same way you have for all your flaws in the past. You fight with wiles and speed because you lack size. Do the same and develop a new fighting style that does not rely on your eyes.”_

But being a shinobi is more than fighting. Someone who could fight on par with jounin would remain in the academy if they could not track, infiltrate, interrogate. Someone who could fight on par with a jounin should remain in the academy if they could not see the displaced speck of dust proving that a house had been broken into, if they could not copy and forge documents, if they could not read the precise expressions on the people they interrogate.

_“There’s plenty a shinobi can do for his village without going out in the field.”_

Yes, that would be the plan. The plan that nobody is happy with.

The plan that nobody has any better alternatives to, so Kakashi had better get used to it quick because it was the future he was going to have to deal with.

Which Obito is not helping with. He’s a child with a child’s mindset and a child’s faith that nothing could go wrong, even with the harshness of his family and the war raging around them. And Kakashi is also a child, decidedly more jaded from how quickly he was turned from boy to soldier to tool, but still a child, even younger than Obito. Even if he doesn’t create the feeling within himself, he wants to believe as well.

Even if he doesn’t want to believe, he can feel Obito’s insistence tugging at his insides, making him wonder what he could do if he tried. Maybe he can become a master of ranged fighting, use some sort of tracking or homing jutsu. Maybe he can focus on assassination, where he can work solely during nighttime so that neither party will have the advantage of vision.

And those are stupid hopes. He’d have to land the tracking jutsu in the first place, and even before then, he’d have to invent one, which, considering the failure that is his _chidori_ , he knows he isn’t capable of doing. And, a unit that can only fight, and only at range, will always be a liability. The latter is even dumber, because he’d still have to navigated forests, houses, palaces, and it would always be more efficient to send an assassin who can work in both the day and night.

It doesn’t matter what logic he tries to bind himself with, though. The lock is opened again.

He was born and raised to be a ninja. It’s no wonder that it’s the entire purpose to his life. He’ll never be satiated unless he’s serving as one, to the peak of what a ninja’s abilities can reach.

Still, he bites his tongue and does not reply.

Apparently, the silence has reached the point where it’s starting to scare Obito, because he chooses then to start crying.

“K-Kakashi,” he says, voice high pitched. It’s the last word he manages to get out before he dissolves into sobbing, and even though it sounds like he’s still trying to talk, nothing intelligible comes out.

What he _does_ manage to do, though, is summon Minato. Or, more accurately, get Minato to reveal that he was hiding outside the doorway, listening in, the entire time.

Kakashi had expected that, so he doesn’t have to hide a sneer.

He hadn’t expected for Minato to jerk off the breathing mask, grab him around the chest, and force him into sitting up.

And then, nothing.

He starts to wonder if this is Minato’s way of forcing him to acknowledge Obito, until he hears a choked inhale, and the realisation that he made his teacher cry comes crashing onto him.

Except, he hasn’t.

Obito is still sniffling behind him, unable to stifle bursts of wailing, but Minato is silent.

Then, two footsteps, the creak of a bed, two more footsteps, and the creak of another bed as Kakashi feels another weight lowering itself next to him on his mattress.

When Minato speaks, it’s with cold fury.

“There is nothing any of us can do for you if you won’t allow us,” he says.

Despite his tone, he moves his hand so that it rests over Kakashi’s. It’s calloused and rough, but all the same, it’s warm and comforting, especially in how it’s large enough to cover Kakashi’s smaller one completely.

With the feeling of the touch, Kakashi knows that Minato’s iciness isn’t completely honest. Although, even without it, he would have known. He has seen Minato truly angry, has felt the way his killing intent floods entire battlefields and chills enemies and allies alike to their bones.

That’s why, when he continues, Kakashi hears concern instead of pity, stoicism instead of professionalism. “What do you want?” he asks. He’s trying his best, and so are Obito and Rin. Kakashi is the one who is wallowing and making things worse for them.

How dare he have the nerve to become a burden, and then refuse to lighten the load that is himself?

So Kakashi replies: “I don’t know.”

He’s hoping that Minato will have the tact to not make a big deal out of his reply, but apparently, he doesn’t. A heavy breath escapes him, clearly relieved, and he reaches over to wrap Kakashi into a hug. Or, a feeble semblance of one — he’s too far away, it’s one-armed because he’s still holding Obito, and Obito is sandwiched awkwardly between them, still crying.

It should feel good and it does, but it’s his teacher’s fallibility that really hits Kakashi.

Minato was also lost. He didn’t know what to do, either. That was why his advice and lecturing had sounded so half-hearted and full of holes.

“When I was your age,” Minato says, and it’s in an almost-whisper.

Kakashi realises that Minato probably can’t stay in control if he speaks any louder, and hates it. Sensei is supposed to be perfect.

“The second war was in full-swing. I was a chuunin, and so were my teammates. We went out on a recon mission, and only I came back.”

He pauses then, voice cutting off cleanly, but Kakashi now knows that it’s not for effect, or to give his audience time to understand his words. It’s because he can’t say it himself. It’s because he isn’t an immovable pillar.

“I’m just glad you’re still here, right now, Kakashi. And you as well, Obito,” he murmurs. He pulls the three of them closer together. “I know it’s hard, and I know this isn’t what anyone wants, and everything is all wrong.”

He doesn’t offer any consolation, and Kakashi wonders how the hell that was supposed to help, but he sinks into the embrace anyways, eyes closed, as if that would make a difference.

* * *

The next day, Kakashi wakes again to unceremoniously having his breathing mask ripped off (to be fair, the only reason he’s still on it is safety) and then being shoved up. Much less fluidly this time, too.

He doesn’t intend to protest, but before he would even have had a chance to, he hears Obito whisper into his ear: “Shhh. It’s the middle of the night. I’m gonna do secret training with you, so you’ll get strong again, ‘cause the doctors are being defeatist old farts.”

_What_.

Out of nowhere, Obito has taken his hand and cupped it firmly, then puts something in his palm.

Kakashi does his best to close his fingers around it. There’s a handle, wrappings over something that’s dense and cool to the touch. A kunai? How had he managed to sneak a weapon into the hospital?

Nevermind that. Obito is slowly pulling his hand away, and Kakashi can feel his own begin to tremble under the weight. The moment Obito lets go, the kunai slips from his grasp, and his arm falls back to the bed a moment later.

“There’s no _point_ ,” he growls, low enough that it’s only audible inside their room. “This isn’t going to help.”

“So what if you can’t hold a kunai yet?!” Obito whisper-snarls back. “You’re going to eventually, so let’s just do something else right now. Like… like hand signs!”

With that, he grabs Kakashi’s hands and brings them to rest by the boy’s abdomen.

“You know I don’t have the dexterity to-”

Obito is already rearranging his fingers into the familiar seals, sequences of familiar, easy jutsus. He leaves it in one. “Okay, hold it like that.”

Kakashi does so. It’s not hard to not move in a position that requires little strength to maintain. “Why-"

“Now move it to the tiger seal. It’s like, almost the same, so it should be easy.”

Kakashi does that, too, except it’s sort of a struggle this time. Obito is right — serpent to tiger is one of the easiest progressions, because they were nearly identical, but when he tries to point his index fingers out, it’s slow and sloppy. Enough to cast a jutsu, not enough to survive a fight.

“Yes! Yes!” A clapping sound as Obito slaps his hand over his mouth. “Whoops,” he says, hushed again. “Got excited, sorry. Now do it backwards!”

That’s easier, so just to see if he can, Kakashi forces his clumsy hands into a ram seal afterwards as well. He may as well try to complete the chain of signs to cast the jutsu, since ram is close enough to the others anyways. It’s graceless. He manages with so little skill that he doesn’t think it will work.

But it does.

He feels the familiar tug of chakra, telling him that the jutsu has been casted.

“Bakakashi!” Obito shouts, already having forgotten to be quiet again. “Are you trying to blind me, too?!” But, his rage dissipates as soon as he sees Kakashi, palms trembling on his lap, eyes wide and bearing down on nothing.

It’s a harmless jutsu in most contexts, this one included. A flash of light decent for disorienting an enemy for a split second, but not really useful because there are more powerful methods to the same with fewer hand seals. It’s not even that bright. Maybe a shock because the room was probably dark, but nothing to justify that much of a reaction.

Leave it to Obito to overreact. So thoughtlessly, too.

(He hadn’t seen a thing, himself. Not even a pinprick shift in the edges of his not-vision.)

“No,” Kakashi says. “Did you think I would? I’m not petty. I don’t let my emotions get in the way of my brain.” His tone is evenly tempered, but that doesn’t make his words sound any less accusing.

And Obito, ever a crybaby, runs away. For once, he doesn’t miss the implications.

Kakashi is not mad at Obito. He swears to himself that he isn’t. Listening to Obito had saved Rin, and saved the mission, the timing so tight that if he had hesitated for a moment after listening to Obito’s plan, everything would have fallen apart. And, he can’t regret it. This is nearly the optimal outcome, all things considered. No casualties, mission success. One shinobi out of action isn’t a high price for such a big win.

Besides, it’s not even Obito’s fault. It was his decision, and the results were on his shoulders, as they should be. He had paved his own road to his father’s dilemma.

Should he sacrifice the mission, or sacrifice the team?

Neither. The answer was to sacrifice himself.

They were praying for too much, going to save Rin and then trying to destroy the bridge as well afterwards. Something had to give.

Kakashi isn’t stupid. He had known the odds of winning, and the odds of survival, before he had headed off to Kannabi Bridge alone. He knew the price and he paid it. It was a good trade.

So he shouldn’t be bitter. Most would consider coming out of that alive a blessing. (But is it wrong for him to not be among them? He doesn’t want to be a coward like his father, but he also doesn’t want _this_.)

And, when he looks at it this way, he understands why Obito is so invested in him, so earnest in wanting to help. Obito set off the chain of events. He feels guilty, because he thinks it was his plan and his mistake in combat that led to this.

Which is true.

But in the end, it was Kakashi’s decision, and the more he contemplates it, the more it feels like it was his destiny, the culminating choice that his life had been leading up to all along.

He chose correctly. _He chose correctly_.

He should be smiling, but he isn’t.


	4. Obito

Obito gets released from the hospital around a week later; it’s been two since he was admitted. 

Normally, he’s itching to get out, and he still is, but that night, as he tosses and turns in his cramped, lonely bedroom, he misses having someone else there with him, to wake and talk to in the middle of the night (or even the afternoon, sometimes) when he couldn’t fall asleep.

Actually, he just misses Kakashi. Somehow, they built more camaraderie in the past few days than they had over years as teammates. 

Not exactly a high bar, as the number was somewhere along the lines of zero. They didn’t really get along per se — but there was just enough companionship to prove that they had some amount of compatibility. They had managed to have actual conversations without one of them berating or trying to kill the other, so maybe Kakashi wasn’t a total jerk after all.

Or maybe he had been, and wasn't any longer, and that had changed. Kakashi had always been overly serious and lacking in spirit, but he had never been one to give up, even against impossible odds. That must have been what had driven him to keep going with the mission after saving Rin. But, it seemed like that effort had used up the remainder of that well of strength.

Obito lets out a sound that’s really too throaty to be considered a sigh but not aggressive enough to be considered a growl before rolling out of bed — literally, but he catches himself on the soles of his feet. He is a ninja, after all, bottom-ranked or not. 

...And then collapses face-first.

He hadn’t expected the jolt of pain, had forgotten about his own injuries in the middle of his groggy, not-quite-awake musings. It’s not unbearable, and more importantly, temporary. Rin is skilled and the surgeons even more so. He’ll never be quite the same but he’ll be functional as a shinobi, probably. ( _ Unlike someone else. _ ) 

He rights himself so that he’s sitting on the floor, and takes a pair of leg braces from under his bed. Again, temporary. Probably. Hopefully. 

Someone might think it was his hands that were injured by how long it takes him to get them on, fumbling with the clasps and needing several tries to position it right, but he does eventually, wrenches himself back onto his bed, and grabs his crutches so he can stand up without giving the floorboards a good morning kiss.

He digs some tasteless cereal out from the corner of his cupboard and eats that for breakfast, dry, because he has no milk. He’s seen people using just water instead but the idea is just kind of repulsive to him. Actually, it’s tasteless and scratches at his throat the way it is now, so it’s not much better, but he works his way through it anyways. He’s hungry now and there’s nothing else available. He can coerce some dango or ramen out of Rin or Sensei later.

He wonders what he should do with the rest of his day, other than trying to make other people buy him food. The next few days, now that he thinks about it. He’s been assigned rest for a week. He knows that Minato won’t let him tag along with anyone else to help out, not even the glorified chores that they called D-ranks. “The war’s winding down,” he had said. “There’s no need,” he had said. 

Well, maybe the need was more because Obito had the attention span of a dead goldfish, and was already feeling all cooped up and bored. It didn’t help that he knew his Sensei was lying. Sure, the actual fighting was coming to a close, but menial tasks were at an all time high, because so much had been piled up while everyone was occupied with the more pressing war. He had seen genin and jounin alike repairing fences, painting signs. Clearly, they were trying to work through the buffer as quickly as they could so that their lifestyle could return to normal. It felt extra bad because he knew he could help, but just wasn’t being allowed to.

He dumps the last couple spoonfuls of his breakfast into the garbage, unable to swallow down any more, and staggers his way outside without any purpose in mind. He’ll just let his mind wander and see where his legs take him.

Surprisingly, it’s not Rin’s place. 

...Which, actually, is not surprising. She’s from a civilian family and her home is located in a civilian’s sector of town. He’s only been there a handful of times, when, um,  _ guarding Rin _ when she walks home after training or a mission. 

Actually surprising, it’s not the hospital.

...Which he tries to pretend is not surprising because it’s not like he cares about Bakakashi that much or anything, even if he had spent most of last night unable to sleep because Kakashi wasn’t there, and then subsequently spent most of that time thinking about Kakashi, trying to figure out what he could do to help his friend, damn it he had not meant to think of Kakashi as a friend, okay fine it’s weird that he hadn’t made a beeline to visit him. 

It’s the memorial stone.

He stands there, arms limp at his side, head drooping as he reads down all the names. There’s a lot of them. Hundreds. At the same time, it seems impossible that  _ every _ deceased Leaf shinobi could be listed. He feels like more have died in this war alone. But what does he know? NInja villages have only been around for a few generations, and most people in the village aren’t ninja anyways. He’s probably just counting wrong. Never had been good with numbers.

It was easy to tell who the big clans were, though. There were dozens and dozens of Hyuuga, and almost as many Uchiha to match. 

No Nohara, obviously, because other than Rin, they were civilians. 

No Namikaze. No Hatake.

Huh.

So you don’t need a prestigious bloodline to be a prodigy after all.

He had known that. His teachers at the academy, and even Minato-sensei had always talked about how he could be whatever he wanted to be, as long as he worked hard. He could be the greatest shinobi even though he was the deadlast. He could be Hokage even though he was an Uchiha. 

But then, Obito’s problem is sort of the opposite. He’s not like his bloodline. He’s not strong and powerful, like he should be. He’s his own person and stands out by being the black sheep, the Uchiha without talent. 

Though, it makes more sense now why Sensei, who was usually so grounded, was so adamant about it. He had proven it with his own life. Against the odds, he, a shinobi with no clan or heritage had survived and made a name for himself. 

Survived.

Like his teammates hadn’t.

Obito wonders which names were the ones who Minato had once fought beside. Which ones had been Minato’s Rin and Kakashi.

No, that’s wrong. They can’t be compared, because Rin and Kakashi won’t be names on the stone. At least, not until they’re old and grey and have lived out their lives. Not when they aren’t even adults yet.

The memorial stone doesn’t list ages, though. Only the names. So it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t care. A shinobi is a shinobi, and the death of a shinobi is the death of a shinobi. Maybe it’s because there’s just no room to care about who the person was. Maybe it's because it's trying to say that all men are equal in death. Maybe it's because this is just a tribute to Konoha's military and the real gravestones, with the things that matter, are elsewhere, in estates, in compounds, in private cemeteries.

Or maybe it’s convenience. The realisation comes with a morbid twist in his stomach, but it makes sense. Being able to mourn everyone in one place would save time, which shinobi have tend to have very little of.

He wonders what that would be like. To spend your time at the memorial stone because you’ve lost so many friends that it’s no longer possible to visit each one’s grave individually. 

Well, it can’t be too common, at least. After all, he’s the only one here right now. Though the fact that every able ninja bar himself is being worked to the bone may have something to do with that.

Reality really seems to love contradicting him, though, because just as soon as the thought passes through his head, he hears footsteps and a voice from behind him. 

The person stays silent. Etiquette at graveyards, though this isn't really a grave at all. He doesn't mind the company, though. His mood is somber but not with the raw grief of someone visiting a deceased loved one. And, he was a little curious.

It’s Minato, who seems to have been looking at him instead of the stone.”

“I didn’t know you came here often, Obito.”

“Me too. Um, that is, I don’t,” Obito stammered. “And I don’t know why I’m here. It just kinda… happened.”

“Ah, that wasn’t very polite of me. You don’t have to explain yourself.”

As is growing frighteningly frequent in pretty much all of Obito’s recent conversations, there’s and awkward silence as neither one of them has anything more to say.

“S-so, did you need me for something, Sensei?” he forces, which, admittedly, actually seems natural now that he thinks about it. It’s too much of a happy coincidence for him to show up at the same time that Obito’s there, so he must have been searching. For a while, too, judging by his comment on it being a rare haunt for Obito. 

“Not particularly. I had some spare time and thought I should check up on you.”

“Got kicked out of the hospital, huh?” It came out more bitter than Obito had intended, for whatever reason. What did he even have to be upset about? “If they told you to rest, you probably should. Even you need a break sometimes, y’know.”

“No, I just wanted to see you.”

“You saw me yesterday.”

Minato looks confused by his resistance. Reasonable, considering that he’s confused by his own resistance. 

“So anyways,” Obito grits out, “how’s Kakashi? And Rin?”

“Rin’s been helping with the physical exams. The annuals. I think she’s looking to graduate from being a field medic to a full-fledged healer.”

Oh. So Rin won’t be going on missions with him anymore. Their team was always doomed to separate. Most teams do, eventually, so he shouldn’t be so disappointed. He imagines being in a team with strangers who will never become anything more than colleagues. He imagines fighting with different allies every week. He imagines going on missions solo. He imagines not being a ninja at all.

There’s that odd resentment again. He’s not upset. He’s happy for her. She’s decided what she wants and she’s chasing after it. Though, he can’t shake the feeling that the reason she doesn’t want to go out into the field again is because of what happened at Kannabi Bridge. She had been taken, after all. It was only luck that let her return unscathed. Anyone would be scared of having to go through that again.

Minato must be able to read the feelings flashing across his face, because he says, “I’m sure she’ll still join you for a job every now and then. She’ll always be a ninja. She’s just choosing a specialization is all. Besides, it won’t be right away, and you’ll always be able to see her when you’re off duty. It’s not like you’ll never see her again.”

That makes sense. But, it doesn’t seem to be the answer to what’s bothering him.

“Do you want to come visit Kakashi?”

Ah. There it is. 

He shrugs. “Sure.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter and quieter chapter, but it's the basis for the rest of Obito's arc. Next time, it's Rin's POV and we get a bit more action. :D


	5. Rin

Rin wishes she could do more to help, but she’s powerless.

Also, she’s a coward.

She could visit more, sit by them to talk and entertain. Moral support. Instead, she throws herself into yet another shift pointless checkups (well, maybe not quite pointless, because apparently adult shinobi are so bad at taking care of themselves that she's had to dig out two embedded pieces of shuriken shrapnel just this morning).

For the first little while, she tries to convince herself that it makes no difference. Her presence won’t change anything.

Which is true. Maybe it’ll make them feel a little happier. Make them a little less bored. It won’t help with their recovery.

Could she help them cope? Yes, definitely. Her uselessness is just an excuse, after all, a way to justify how she hasn’t seen them once since they returned.

She’s a coward.

She finishes a row of stitches and starts bandaging up a wound. This is easier. Sewing strangers up, getting the blood on her hands. It’s almost therapeutic to shut her brain off of everything else and focus on fixing the problem put in front of her. A good week of rest and this particular soldier will be good as new.

The next patient walks in. She smiles and greets him, except it’s not a patient.

It’s her supervisor.

“You’re still here, Rin?” he asks, already flipping through the logs of the shifts taped onto the door. “You’ve been working since six this morning. It’s four in the afternoon. You haven’t even eaten. Take a break.”

“No, it’s fine,” she protests. “I enjoy-”

“It’s a risk to your patients when you work while tired. Take a break.”

Rin’s eyes shift guiltily to the floor. His words leave no room for argument, and it’s because he’s right. It’s selfish of her to use others as an excuse like this. “Alright,” she says. “I’ll be back tomorrow morning.”

* * *

 And thus, Rin finds herself walking towards the hospital Kakashi and Obito have been put in, because she’s been thoroughly wrung of self-imposed distractions.

She schools her face into a smile and waves to the receptionist. They know each other, after all. They’ve worked together briefly before, and it looks like their proximity will only increase in the near future, if Rin’s career goes as she intends it to.

“Hi,” she says. “I’m here to visit Uchiha Obito and Hatake Kakashi?”

“You must be their teammate.” The receptionist’s smile is professional. She’s older than Rin, more experienced, and it shows. “Third floor, room 307. It should be in the hallway to the left of the staircase.”

She nods in acknowledgement and goes. She’s both glad for and annoyed by the multiple flights of stairs. There’s another couple minutes worth of delay before she has to do this, but there’s also another couple minutes where she has to feel the dread and anxiety swelling in her gut. She just wants to get this over with, but she also doesn’t want to do it at all. Which, she supposes, is typical of things you want to finish in a rush and never think back on. If it’s not something unpleasant, you wouldn’t have that reaction.

She surprises herself when she doesn’t hesitate when she sees the door, slightly ajar, and then again when her hand is on the doorknob and she pushes it right open.

“Hi, Kakashi, Obito,” she says immediately. She had begun speaking before she had even entered, made especially obvious because she had missed an entire person. “Er, Kakashi, Obito, Minato-sensei,” she corrects. “I stopped by a bakery on the way here and got some cookies.” She raises the hand with the little paper bag, and hands it to Obito when he reaches for it.

Then she gets a good look at the room. There’s only one bed.

She blinks. The scene doesn’t change.

“...Have you two been sharing the bed?” she asks, completely lost. She had seen empty rooms, with empty beds. There was no way they were out of space.

“Mmf ga’ scharged,” Obito supplies, rather unhelpfully, around a mouthful of cookie.

Minato laughs, gently. “I think he means to say that he was discharged a couple days ago, he explains.”

Rin can picture his fond expression even though his back is to her, because he’s helping Kakashi back onto the bed. Sensei is always smiling, vibrant and warm.

She shrinks away, like she’s hiding from the sun before it burns her.

She doesn’t deserve it. It’s audacious of her to step in here, smiling, like nothing’s happened. It’s impossible for her to let them pretend as well. Obito had been released from the hospital before she even bothered to go visit him once. She hadn’t even known, hadn’t bothered to keep updated. She barely knows what his injuries even were, same with Kakashi. Obito shouldn’t be acting so relaxed around her, eating snacks and smiling, just like Minato shouldn’t be laughing and being kind.

At least Kakashi’s still standoffish, though that, too, is him acting the same as always.

“Hello, Rin.”

Scratch that, Kakashi isn’t the same, and that’s actually worse.

Look at her. Wants things one way, gets it, then wants it the other way, gets it, and doesn’t want that either.

“Hey, Kakashi,” she says in return. Her precise control isn’t just over chakra. Ninja also have to be able to act and lie and conceal, and that, she also excels in. “How’re you doing?”

In lieu of saying anything, he stares at her. Or, doesn’t stare at her, actually, but it’s even more disconcerting. A couple seconds of looking into his ( _empty, vacant_ ) eyes is all it takes to make her cringe away, and she resolutely fixes her gaze on her feet, refusing to glance up. Minato and Obito probably saw that, but neither of them have moved or said anything.

She was the best actor, after all. If she couldn’t keep up the ruse, they didn’t even have a chance to. Whether the ruse they dropped was towards Kakashi or towards her, she was less certain of.

Or, she was wrong entirely, and they were both giving her the chance to backtrack without interference in hopes that Kakashi wouldn’t notice.

Probably not, but even if they hadn’t noticed, she knew that the save was already in her grasp, so long as she didn’t drop the ball again.

“Sorry I haven’t been visiting,” she says, sounding guilty, but that’s intentional, to drive the attention away. Her guilt is obvious, but she can at least make it seem like it’s for something else, even if that something else is equally painful for her. It won’t be for the others, and that’s what matters right now.

“I’ve been pretty busy with work. Most of the shinobi forces haven’t had a checkup in years, so it was basically a flood. It’s cooling down now, though, so I should be able to come around more often.” She very deliberately not making anything certain, leaving herself excuses to fall back on. In her heart, though, it’s a promise that she prays she’ll be able to keep.

She wants to do all these things, she really does, even if she can never get herself to actually do them. “I um… I really wanted to help out with you guys too. So if there’s ever anything…”

Minato smiles. Better phrased, he smiles more, because the corners of his lips seem permanently upturned when he’s around his students. “Of course, Rin. It’d be good practice for you in the future, too.”

Kakashi tenses. “I can walk fine alone,” he snaps, even though Rin was fairly certain he couldn’t. Rin had just seen him being carried back onto his bed, after all, and the most logical explanation would be that he couldn’t manage it on his own. Why he was off of it in the first place could have a similar explanation — most likely, he was practicing, slowly working strength back into his body while Minato supported most of his weight.

It only takes a moment for Rin to realise why he’s protesting so much. It’s not hard, to be fair. He can’t, and he doesn’t want to show weakness to anyone else.

“No,” Minato interjects before Rin can respond. He’s stern now, and Rin figures that he’s found putting his foot down is the only way to make Kakashi do anything right now. “No, you can’t. It’s not safe to push yourself. And, no, I don’t think that’s what we should do. You’re already tired, Kakashi. I was going to have you work on touch.”

That sounds easier, less embarrassing if failure were to occur, but if anything, Kakashi looks even more opposed to the idea.

“That’s stupid,” he says, his mood darkening quickly. “I can tell things apart.”

“Come on Kakashi, just let me feel useful for a bit. Please?” It all sounds too selfish and condescending in her own head, but Minato shoots her a grateful smile and Kakashi relents.

“Fine,” he says. “But I’m just telling you, it’s…”

Pointless, too easy? Or pointless, too hard? Both are plausible but the latter seems more likely, considering Kakashi’s behaviour and how unlucky her day as been so far.

Minato slides open the drawer in the nightstand. It’s filled with odds and ends — a kunai, an exploding tag, a hitai-ate, a ration bar — things that would be useful to a ninja.

Although, Rin finds it a bit odd. Aren’t there plenty more things that would be needed in everyday life that would be more useful? She gets that Kakashi wants to keep being a shinobi, but this is just impractical.

She doesn’t say anything, though. Kakashi’s right there, after all.

Instead, she makes eye-contact with Minato, a slight tilt to her head in silent inquiry to confirm that she’s supposed to do what she thinks she is. Minato nods.

Quietly, she walks up to the drawer. It’s not quite silent enough to prevent Kakashi from knowing she had moved, but there was just a silent air to the entire activity that made her minimize noise instinctively. Even Obito is quieter, though he’s still eating and the noise of it is piercing in contrast.

She picks something out of the drawer at random. A coil of rope, thick and hardy, handy in just about every situation, and puts it into Kakashi’s waiting hands. His fingers brush it for not a moment before he starts to say something, but cuts off sharply before going back to the rope, shaky fingers running over the coils.

“Rope,” he says at last, wavering voice betraying his lack of confidence.

“Rope,” Minato confirms, before taking it back and replacing it. “What were you going to say at first?” His voice is flat, like the question is out of procedure and not curiosity.

“Rope,” Kakashi says.

Minato looks unsurprised. “Trust yourself, Kakashi. You know everything I’ve brought here; there’s only a handful of items. Hesitation will get you killed.”

“I know,” he says, sounding just a bit petulant. “It’s just really… Um, y’know…”

Oh. So this isn’t about sensory detection at all, then. These items were all things Minato had just happened to have on his body when he initially devised the activity, because what they were didn’t actually matter. The real point of this exercise was to train Kakashi’s mental.

Which made too much sense, actually. Rin knew that Kakashi was a fast learner. It seemed like he had natural talent in everything he ever tried to do. Some people had been concerned, thinking that this would be the exception, but really, why would it be? The exception was interpersonal skills, and this did not fit into that category.

His fatal flaw, though, had always been his own head, the same reason he had never been able to communicate effectively — and it was still the problem, now. Minato isn’t stupid. He must have realized it, too. If Rin was told that Kakashi had aced this test on his first try, she would believe it, because she knew that he could. If she was told that he had aced the test on his first try, but continued to feel insecure, she would believe it, because that’s what she’s seeing right now.

Well. She had gotten lost in dwellings long enough. They were waiting for her, clearly, because Minato had just gestured to the array of objects again, prompting her to continue.

She chooses the kunai, and hands it to him.

As soon as his hand wraps around the handle, he says, “Kunai.”

He’s overcompensating this time, doing everything in a rush.

...That’s just her being unfair, though. She can hardly complain about an instantaneous response, criticizing him for that is the very definition of “doomed if you do, doomed if you don't”. She’s not supposed to be the pessimistic one.

“Yes,” she says, definitely missing a beat, but he doesn’t seem to notice. “How about this?”

“Hitai-ate,” he says as soon as the smooth fabric hits his hands, again unnaturally quickly.

“But which village’s?”

He bites his lip and follows the loop with one hand until he finds the piece of metal, and slowly traces the symbol engraved on it. Apparently, he’s having trouble visualizing it, because he’s gone over the pattern two or three times before he freezes and his brow furrows. “Konoha.”

“Yep. Nice.” Except, it’s not, because what else could it have been? It has to be the same one that Minato’s used with him before, and besides, where could she, or even Minato, have gotten another village’s headband in such a short amount of time? “Don’t overthink things,” she mumbles, half-hoping that he doesn’t hear  it.

From how he curls in on himself, he definitely did.

She grabs something else, and gives it to him, he guesses right again, and Minato says something encouraging that goes in one ear and out the other. Obito is still eating in the background, wordless the entire time, but looking sullen.

She wishes she could be anywhere else. By the looks of it, everyone else here shares that sentiment. Even Minato. He’s smiling and trying to bring some cheer, but it’s painfully obvious from the bags under his eyes that he’s exhausted and miserable and is just trying to be a good role model for them. It’s not working, at all.

It’s unfortunate that none of them are willing to be the first to leave, or the first to say anything. Even Obito, for once, sits, in mostly-silence.

Eventually, nearly an hour of this later, a nurse comes with Kakashi’s dinner. It looks generic hospital food. Unappetizing, but theoretically nutritious. Minato beckons her to move out of the way and she does, switching seats with him as he settles where she was on the bed next to Kakashi, the tray on his lap as he unwraps the plastic fork.

“It looks like stew and rice, with some berries on the side,” he says. “Do you want to try doing it yourself again?"

Kakashi’s hand closes into a fist, but it’s loose and trembling. Rin can see how little strength and stability there is. Not enough to hold a fork, probably.

“Alright, then,” Minato says, and Kakashi obediently tugs down his mask and eats when Minato spears a piece of meat and brings it to his lips.

This must be routine by now, judging from how easily Kakashi accepts it, to think nothing of it and obey so easily. Especially with having to take off his mask. She’s seen his face before, being the team’s medic. Accidents happen in the field and a bit of privacy is not worth risking an infection for.

Still, though, Rin wonders how hard it was to get Kakashi to agree to being fed the first time, or the second time, or even the third. She knows firsthand how stubborn he is when he wants to be.

He eats the rest of the meal mechanically and in silence, barely reacting to the small conversation starters Minato attempts. When he finishes, though, he says quietly, “Thank you,” before turning onto his side, away from them, giving the impression of sleep. Or, to Rin, of a child faking sleep to avoid an unwanted interaction.

She can’t judge him for it, though. Herself is a better person to deride right now, for causing all this.

Minato looks at Kakashi for a moment, motionless, before turning back to her and Obito, face arranged into cheerfulness. “How about we get some dinner?”

Obito stands up instantly, just as eager to be removed from this room as Rin is. “Dango after?” he asks, hopefully.

“I don’t see why not. I’ll be back tonight, okay, Kakashi?”

Has Minato been spending his nights here? That’s… crazy. And, the absolute antithesis to what Rin’s been doing.

“See you tomorrow, Kakashi,” she says, and Obito echoes something similar before running up to his bedside and giving him a hug, awkward because of Kakashi’s position and inability to engage.

She wishes she could do something similar, but, as always, she’s a coward.

* * *

 Once they’re outside, Minato looks to her. “Are you doing okay, Rin?”

She nods. “How about you, Sensei?”  
  
“Let’s go for Ichiraku’s, shall we?”

* * *

So they do. The noodles are noodles. Ramen has never been Rin’s favourite, nor are they Obito’s or Minato’s, but they’re comforting because they’ve come here together so often over the years that sitting down on the stool and ordering the shio ramen makes her feel at home.

There’s an empty seat between herself and Minato which very much does not feel cozy and homely, though, so she focuses on her food, bending close enough to the bowl that the gap is out of her periphery.

They eat, then find a street food stand to get dango at, which is again comforting and again not quite right because the voice calling Obito childish for loving sweets is missing. They go through the motions, though, as best as they can. For each others’ sakes.

Minato insists on walking them home. They protest, but it’s half-hearted. Rin gives in almost right away, knowing it’s more for Minato’s peace of mind than her own safety, and Obito caves after being bribed with a second stick of dango.

They can take care of themselves just fine, but who can blame Minato for being a little overprotective right now?

Obito gets back to the Uchiha compound without any hassle, then they turn to head for Rin’s home in the civillian’s residential district.

Minato tries to make conversation again, and this time, it works. Rin’s social skills aren’t quite enough to counteract how the two boys’ can be so abysmal they stop everyone’s conversation, but she can definitely hold one under normal circumstances.

They talk about easy things — tonight’s dinner, a new recipe Kushina found, Rin’s new work. The conversation comes to a natural death when they arrive at the house, and they wave goodbye to each other.

Just as she’s pushing open the gate, she hears him speak again.

“You know, Rin, you shouldn’t worry about me. Worrying is my job. I’ll take of things, okay?

“Yeah, but I… I worry too,” she says, looking down and steeling her determination. “Could you wait here for a moment, Sensei?”

She turns back to look at him. He’s standing right under a streetlight, illuminated by the yellow glow. It’s dark enough that he’s the only thing she can see, and it looks almost like he’s the one emitting the light.

“Of course. May I... ask why?”

He’s been hiding his uncertainty all day. It’s subtle, but Rin can hear it all pouring out in just one sentence. He says he’ll take care of things, but he hasn’t even managed to take care of himself, yet.

“I want to let my parents know that I’m spending the night at the hospital.”


	6. Minato

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long! D: I should be back to more frequent updates from now on.

Minato has walked into the hospital enough times in the past few weeks that he doesn’t need comfort as he does so, but all the same, Kushina holding his hand gives him comfort. It feels like he’s gone back to the day Obito and Kakashi were brought in, when he had sat in the waiting hall, telling himself again and again that no news was good news.

Of course, he knows that’s not what’s happening. He knows exactly what he’s walking into, now. 

Kushina doesn’t, because she was called on for a mission shortly after their return. She hasn’t had a chance to visit yet, so if she feels similarly to him, it makes sense, for her situation, at least. He has tried to prime her, though, told her everything after she had rested so that nothing would be a surprise. She’s such a ball of fire that he doesn’t know if it will quell her reaction any, but maybe that little bit of preparation will stop her from blowing Konoha into a crater.

She had her own advice to throw into the pot of course, which Minato perhaps did not agree with as much as he wanted to. Boisterous tenacity may have been successful in most of Kushina’s problems, but somehow, doing things over and over until it worked didn’t seem to be the best solution here, or a solution at all. Actually, it was very much the opposite of what he thought Kakashi should do.

Which, fortunately, Kakashi seemed to be listening to. He was always the most obedient of Minato’s three students, despite Rin having the softer temperament. He’d question and argue, but he’d always do it, and do it as best as he could. He’d take the occasional scowls and complaints if it meant Kakashi staying put and recovering, because other than that, he was doing well, better than expected. Obito had really managed to talk sense into him.

So, the last thing Minato expects to see when he enters Kakashi’s room is Kakashi, up and walking. Which, of course, he only realizes because that is exactly what he sees: Kakashi, leaning against the wall for balance and support, taking one shaking step after another in a slow lap around the room. 

“K-Kakashi, what are you-”

He rushes forwards. It’s good that he does, because Kakashi chooses that moment to topple. Or, more likely, he was startled and lost his concentration. He fell because Minato was there, so Minato being there to catch him isn’t so much luck as it is cause-and-effect. 

Kakashi squirms against Minato’s arms. “I was fine,” he protests. His voice is quiet, but fringing on resentment.

Minato sets him back down in his bed anyways, and pulls the covers over him for good measure. Maybe he’s going too far, but he’d rather be safe than sorry. A little extra warmth never hurt anyone, and maybe the weight and comfort would be a deterrent to prevent Kakashi from getting up on his own again.

“I don’t care how well you were doing on you own,” Minato says. “It’s not safe. I know I sound like a broken record right now, but please be patient. You’ll be allowed to start walking when your body is ready to. Rushing things won’t help.”

He’s given this lecture enough times that Kakashi doesn’t bother to resist.

Kushina, though, is a different story.

She’s glaring at him, eyes burning with the intensity she’s known for.

He loves Kushina. He loves her very, very much, has loved her since they were children, so it pains him to think of her in any negative light, but the only word for what she does is goading. It’s the wrong way to go about this, the worst way.

“You’re… You’re gonna give up that easily, huh?” she jeers, face twisted into a half-cruel expression he’s never seen before. “I, um, I thought jounin were supposed to be strong of mind.”

“Kushina,” he warns, not turning to face her.

“You’re just listening to him like that? Letting him decide your life for you? I-idiot!”

“Kushina.”

“Shut up.”

As inopportune a time as it is, Minato can’t not be impressed by Kakashi. Where brutal fury had looked awkward and forced on Kushina, the way it did when she borrowed a shirt that was two sizes too big for her, Kakashi’s wore it like it was his skin. His fury was brutal without effort, ice-cold and threatening even though he was a hospitalized child talking to two elite shinobi. 

“What do you know about me,” he snarls. “What do you know about me that I don’t, to make you think that you know what’s right for me better than myself.”

Minato stills. This is supposed to happen. Kakashi needs to exert himself, too. He’s locked it up, he’s been silent, he’s acted normal. He’s never blamed anyone, always quietly saying that it was his choice and he didn’t regret it when prompted. He needs to be angry. He needs to lash out, that’s all.

“I know you’re not gonna say anything, neither of you are, because you just have one thing you think is right that you keep saying over and over again and you never listen or look even though you’re the ones that can, and it’s so annoying, I wish you would just- just-” He cuts off and makes a frustrated noise, like he’s unable to coagulate all his thoughts and feelings into meaningful ideas he can say in words.

Minato leans down again and envelopes Kakashi into a hug. “Please tell me what you need, Kakashi.”

“You’re always like this,” Kakashi says into his shirt, sounding no less angry. He’s tense in the grip, but does not struggle. His voice buzzes into Minato’s body, loud enough for him to hear, but not enough for Kushina. “You always say everything wrong. You can’t just look at it and think about it and figure it out.”

Well, it’s such a tiny improvement that it probably wouldn’t matter to Kakashi, but he does realize that “ _ I don’t know what to do either _ ” is not the correct answer.

He keeps his arms wrapped around Kakashi.

Eventually, Kakashi relaxes.

He wonders if he did it right for once or if Kakashi was just too tired. 

He doesn’t commit the error of asking, because by the time he pulls away, Kakashi has fallen asleep.

* * *

Kushina doesn’t speak to him for the entirety of the walk home.

He waits until they’re inside, away from prying ears. (He’s a candidate for being the next Hokage, after all. Even though he’s not exactly doing amazing with his personal relationships, he knows how to present himself and play the political game.)

“That may not have been the smartest way to go about it,” he says, mildly. 

Hm. This may not be the smartest way to go about it either. 

Deliberately, he drifts into the kitchen and sets a pot of water to boil, opening a couple packets of noodles as he waits. 

He’s lucky that damage-control is always easy with Kushina’s never-changing taste.

...Or not, is what he begins to think as Kushina slams down her fourth bowl, wordlessly demanding a fifth, without once having glanced at him.

“Kushina,” he starts, mildly. There are so many ways to say her name and so many meanings behind them, he muses. “Perhaps we will disagree, but I think it is best to let Kakashi decide for himself.”

He feels like he’s missed the point. He sets the bowl down in front of her anyways, and she slurps down a mouthful.

“Another.”

* * *

“Sensei, I’m being called out for a mission. I just thought I should let you know before going, even though it’s with a different team and all…”

Minato freezes. “...I thought you were transitioning into medicine.”

“Yeah, but I guess they’re short-staffed and medical ninja are always in demand. I don’t think I’ll ever be completely free of my out-of-village duties, since I’ve already gotten the training for it.”

“Who’s in your team?”

“Um, I think the captain is an Aburame and she’s leading Genma and I.”

"That doesn't sound balanced," he says, and though his voice is as level as it always is, he knows that he had blurted it out before thinking. Yes, the team isn’t balanced by traditional standards, but there’s all sorts of explanations for that. Specialized teams exist, exist for a reason, and this was probably one of those. 

“It’s search-and-rescue,” Rin explains, ever patient. “A group of children went missing a while ago. They were in training to become a survey squad, I think, but it was in our own territory, so their disappearance is… odd. It’s doubtful that they’re… still alive, but the Sandaime thinks we should figure out what happened to them, since it was.. Y’know. I’m sure the families will be grateful if we can retrieve the bodies, at least.”

It’s close to home, on their own grounds, and most of the invaders have backed off, so it should be safe, but a chill runs down Minato’s spine anyways. Children make mistakes, but there could always be something more. If they have to investigate as well as collect the bodies, alive or dead, that means the threat is still unknown. For all they know, there could still be lingering enemies, hidden behind every tree. 

“I see,” he mutters. "Well, best of luck, Rin. Be safe."

“Of course, Sensei,” she says. “I have to go meet my team for the prep work now. See you!”

He watches her leave, her steps steady, and knows that the hidden weight of his words will not be lost on her. 

All the same, she’s not even out of sight before he starts wracking his brain for any excuse he has to join her, or at least be close by during her mission.

* * *

Hiruzen gives him a long look and nods.

In return, he doesn't even spare the Hokage half a glance before warping to the village gates to chase Rin and her team.

He tails them through their entire mission, just out of range of being detected. Actually, no, that’s impossible, considering that they’re being led by an Aburame, who’s probably got eyes over the entire Land of Fire, but either she’s a fraud or Hiruzen has tipped her off of what Minato’s doing. Most likely the latter.

Nothing happens, fortunately, but he’s glad he came nonetheless, because something is… not right. He feels a creeping unease the entire journey that the other three don’t seem to share, to the point that he’s giving the evidence they find a second investigation, just in case.

Nothing turns up, though, including the bodies.

They follow the path the lost team was supposed to have taken, and there are traces of the path being used — markings on trees, areas flattened out from camps. 

And then it stops.

The group wanders the site that the group must have last been in for the better part of a week, the Aburame’s insects swarming every nook and cranny and turning up with nothing.

They turn to head home, ready to report their findings, but Minato stays.

He stands perfectly still in the middle of the clearing, looking at every upturned leaf on the ground, every exposed pebble, every marking on the trees’ bark. Something is wrong with this picture. Something has to be wrong, he knows it in his heart. His instincts are never wrong. They can’t be, or he’d have been dead long ago.

Nothing is wrong.

It looks just as it should, like any other scene passed by Konoha’s shinobi. Untouched, symbols on the trees indicating that they had passed the location without incident.

He closes his eyes, lips pressed into a grim smile.

Nothing is wrong.

The missing shinobi are children.

That's what’s wrong.

* * *

“Sandaime-sama.”

Hiruzen’s head jerks up to look at him, alarm written all over his features. 

“The team-”

“They’re fine,” he says. He had rushed back after his realization, leaving the team actually assigned the mission behind. He’s not supposed to be here, not before them, but this is too urgent. Already, he’s certain that he’s too late.

“I believe that there is a traitor in Konoha,” he says. “There were no corpses or signs of struggle, but the area was too clean. Rearranged to be innocent. Another nation would have no reason to hide their involvement considering the ongoing war, and if the group never did move past that location, then the markings on the trees must have been faked, and only someone from Konoha would know.”

Hiruzen has his eyes closed, deep in thought. Minato wonders if he had suspected all along, or already had confirmation. “Serendipitous that you followed them,” he says, finally.

“I would hardly say so, my lord.”

Though Hiruzen’s on the lower plane, shorter and sitting, Minato feels like he’s being looked down on from above. His Hokage seems to be in no mood for idle exchanges. “Thank you, Minato. I will let you know if I learn any more, but I ask you to keep this private for the time being.”

“Of course,” he says, bowing. “Should I investigate?” He doesn’t know where he would even start, but if he goes back, looks for long enough, there has to be  _ something _ -

“No. This is dangerous, especially for you.”

* * *

His cheer as he greets Kakashi this time is as false as it’s ever been, but he is honestly excited to see how Kakashi’s progressed over the dozen or so days he’s been gone. That’s helped by the receptionist, who gives him a smile and points him in the direction of the rehabilitation area instead of the usual bedroom.

The answer is audible, and it’s “a lot”.

He starts being able to hear the tapping halfway down the hall. It’s slow and a bit unsteady, but the fact that Kakashi is walking unsupported is leaps and bounds ahead of where he was the last time Minato saw him. 

The door to the room is open, which explains why it was so easy to hear — Kakashi is still a trained ninja, and they’ve been taught to avoid noise and keep everything as quiet as possible, even when off-duty. 

He catches the eyes of a therapist hovering just behind Kakashi. She seems to recognize him and beckons him inside.

It looks like the wide floor area has been set up to be an obstacle course of sorts, soft blocks around the height of Kakashi’s chest arranged sparsely to simulate walls. He’s holding a cane, long and thin, and he taps it from side to side as he moves through the circuit. As he approaches a block in front of him, he slows, as though he knows it’s there and is expecting it, but he still jolts backwards when his cane bumps into it.

“Remember that you can use your free hand.”

The therapist sounds like a soft person, but maybe that’s not a good thing, because Kakashi doesn’t obey.

“There’s no shame,” she encourages, as Kakashi continues inching his way forward, his right hand still fisted in his shirt. “Your cane is a good tool, but it has its limits, so you have other tools to supplement it. If you need to follow a wall, use something that can do that.”

Kakashi does that, turning to the left so that his free right hand can trail along the wall. It’s good that he does, because he hits an opening for a turn that he wouldn’t have noticed otherwise, and it leads him to the edge of the room, which must be the end of the maze. He whips around immediately, everything about his expression accusing despite most of being covered. “You were just trying to give me a hint.”

To her credit, the therapist only laughs. “Yes, but the advice stands. You can take it or leave it, it makes no difference to me.” She ignores Kakashi’s little grunt. “Anyways, you did well. Remember to keep moving your cane even when you’re following your other hand, but other than that, much better than yesterday. Your technique is already improving, so how about we call it a day? It looks like there’s someone here to see you, anyways.”

Kakashi outright flinches. He must have been intensely focussed, to not notice a spectator’s presence.

It takes him a moment to read the chakra signature. “...You’re back sooner than I expected, Sensei,” he says stiffly, but there’s an undertone of relief. 

“Change of plans.” He smiles, moving towards Kakashi. The therapist gives him a thumbs up and slips out. “What have you been up to?”

“Nothing,” Kakashi whisper-mutters under his breath, but it’s harsh enough that Minato can hear him anyways. “Um, therapy. For walking around and doing normal things, mostly.”

“That’s good! It sounds like you’re almost out of here, then!”

Kakashi turns away. It takes him a moment to notice the involuntary action, and he starts fumbling with his cane to hide it, slowly folding it up until it’s only a couple handspans long. “Um, actually, I got released a couple days ago.”

Minato does his best to be calm, to not give justification for Kakashi’s body language, but doesn't quite manage it. He's been jittery and overprotective as of late, and he knows it, but who can blame him? (Kushina, Kakashi, and even Obito, probably.)

“Alone?” he asks, already knowing the answer. “Has anyone been staying with you, or cooking, or-”

“Obito got me some packed meals,” Kakashi says hastily. “I’m fine, I know my own home.”

He’s unconvinced. It’s good of Obito to help out how he can, but his apartment is too tiny to share and he’s not exactly at peak health himself. Actually, he’s a little concerned about Obito being alone as well, but at least he’s surrounded by the other Uchiha. “I think you should come stay with me, at least for a little while.”

“I’m fine,” Kakashi replies, taut. “I can handle myself.”

“I know you can, but do it for me? I have a spare room, anyways, so it’s no hassle.”

Kakashi shifts uncomfortably. “I’d rather not.”

“Just for dinner?”

Kakashi keeps shaking his head. If anything, it’s even more fervent than before. 

Minato runs a hand through his hair, suppressing a sigh. “I’m not trying to give you a hard time, I’m just worried, you know?” 

It doesn’t look like that helps at all, though, because Kakashi doesn’t budge.

“Let me walk you home, at least.”

Kakashi nods, but shies away at the same time. He turns his body even farther away from Minato as he starts unfolding his cane again, expression hinting that he was instantly regretting his choice of idle fiddling. 

He reaches out, taking Kakashi’s wrist and pulling it away from the cane. "Relax," he says, allowing his hand to slip down to grasp Kakashi’s. “I want to help you.”

The moment seems to freeze, the two of them locked together in time.

Then, Kakashi slides the cane into a pocket, and presses his body against Minato. He whispers, “Just going home.”


	7. Kakashi

Minato's promise to "Just walk him home" turns into an involuntary invitation for dinner because Minato wants to "Make sure he’s eating properly, convenience store meals aren’t healthy,” but as soon as they get through the door, it’s “Kakashi, you look a bit pale, do you want to go lie down for a bit?”

Admittedly, he wasn’t feeling fantastic. He still can't make it through the day without resting, doubly so after hours of therapy, so he agrees without any complaint.

It turns out that Minato already had a room set up for him. He lies down and what feels like a heartbeat later, he blinks awake.

He's only certain that he slept at all because of the grogginess behind his eyelids. He doesn't feel rested at all.

The sound of the door creaking open was what woke him up. He's grateful that his instincts are still there, even after several weeks of letting them waste away. 

No, that’s not it. He’s always been a light sleeper, and there are certain things ingrained so deeply that they can’t ever be forgotten. This is one of them.

He was being too easy on himself, giving himself too much credit for doing too little.

In frustration with himself, he bites his lip, hard, but not hard enough to draw blood. Minato's right there, after all.

“Are you awake, Kakashi? I brought your dinner." Minato's voice is quiet, like he's worried that Kakashi is still asleep. 

Dinner? He must have been asleep for three or four hours, then. More than he had expected.

It's unpleasant to be treated like an invalid, but it'd be rude to be ungrateful when he's a guest being taken care of. 

"Yeah," he mumbles, pushing himself up. He's more tired than he wants Minato to know he is, even after the nap. About the same as he’s felt the past couple of days, but then, those times he was out cold the moment he got home, so again, it's nothing to be proud of.

He pushed the covers away from himself and something is set on his lap, then something he realises a moment later are chopsticks is pressed into his hand. 

He fumbles with them, trying to figure out top from bottom, but it only lasts for a second before they slip out of his grasp.

"Sorry," he mutters, feeling over the bed to find where they had fallen. He manages to scoop it back into his fingers, but he knows from experience that actually trying to use them is pointless. When he was on his own, he had only had rice balls, which were easy enough to eat even with his poor motor skills and coordination. 

He doesn't have to muster up the courage to tell Minato because they fall again before he's able to open his mouth. 

And now he’s shaking even though he’s sitting in a bed and leaning against a wall. Maybe the poison isn’t to blame this time, but it’s a good enough excuse to convince himself with. 

“Would you prefer a fork?” Minato asks, gentle and unjudging as always, but also a bit too quickly.

Kakashi can only nod mutely.

"Alright. I'll be right back." He stops to ruffle Kakashi's hair before he leaves. 

Just like he had back in the hospital. It's like nothing has changed.

He returns not long later, and puts the aforementioned fork into Kakashi's hand.

He grips it in his fist, which is to say, oddly, but it's the only way he can give enough strength and stability to actually use it right now.

"I put everything on a tray," Minato says, which explains the weight on his legs. "Give me a moment, I'll show you where the actual food is."

Minato takes his hand and guides it, touching the fork to each item and softly naming each one. 

“Rice,” as they poke at a bowl right in front of him. “Fish,” on a plate to his left, then “carrots,” on the same plate as the fish. “Miso soup.” Behind the other two dishes, halfway between them.

“Thank you,” Kakashi murmurs. He whispers a short prayer under his breath as Minato seats himself on the edge of the bed (too similar to the setup at the hospital for his comfort, but he’s already imposing so he tries to ignore it) then carefully prods at a piece of fish. It seems like it’s been cut into cubes, judging by the general size and how the weight tips when he rolls a chunk of it over. 

Who’s work could that have been? Minato seems unlikely because he hadn’t realised the issue at first, but nothing in Kushina’s temperament, or general actions towards him, speak of any sort of attention to detail. 

Actually, now that he thinks about it, he’s not sure who actually made this meal. His assumption had been Minato, but only because Kushina’s far less present in his life and she never springs to mind as quickly. 

From what he knows of married shinobi, which includes Minato and Kushina, whoever is less exhausted cooks. Or, in other words, whoever isn’t collapsed and more dead than alive. Minato’s just returned from a mission, so it should be Kushina, but the scent of miso soup isn’t nearly as rich as that of her signature recipe. Besides, there’s rice, which is definitely not Kushina — she cooks one thing and one thing only.

What a silly question. He had known the answer from the start.

Sick of playing with his food, he finally pushes his fork into a chunk of the fish. He does his best to keep his hand steady as he raises it, knowing full well he’s failing and hoping that Minato isn’t watching.

He gets through the fish reasonably quickly, never dropping a piece though that’s more from the tendency of fish to stay put when it’s stabbed than it is from his own ability. The carrot behaves similarly, cut into blocks and cooked soft enough that it’s easy to spear. For his part, he’s only dropped the fork twice; by no means an achievement but better than usual for him.

There’s still the rice left, though. He’s not exactly excited, because there’s no way that’ll go neatly. The soup, too, which he’s been ignoring under the pretense of letting it cool, intimidates him a little more than he’s willing to admit.

Half the problem is that he’s clumsy with utensils, but it’s still the best way to go about it. He doesn’t dare to pick up the soup bowl outright. He can’t see how full it is and with how unsteady he is, it’s definitely going to spill over the edge. And, that’s given the generous assumption that he doesn’t just drop the entire bowl. 

Rice it is, then. 

He puts the fork down (you can’t really stab rice and a flat surface is going to be harder to hold the grains on) and palms around where the soup bowl is for the spoon. He scoops up what he guesses is a small mouthful, and stills. Maybe it’d be easier if he held the bowl up, closer to himself, but, well, he doesn’t want to dump it all over Sensei’s bed. A spoonful is less than a bowlful, which is preferable both in terms of wasted food and cleanup. 

He must have hesitated for too long, though, because suddenly, the mattress is shifting which reminds him that Minato is  _ right there _ and he freezes as he feels the spoon being tugged out of his clenched hand. 

His head jerks up to face Minato's direction.

"Shh. It'll be easier if you let me help."

Kakashi shrinks away but it's not like there's much space for him to move, with the excessive amount of blankets he's swathed in. Minato had called him out correctly — the protest was still dying on the tip of his tongue. 

He lets Minato feed him silently, trying to convince himself that it’s not any different than it was in the hospital. It's more difficult to shove down the embarrassment because it’s not so much that he physically can’t as it is that he can’t without making a mess, so he's mostly unsuccessful, but he manages to get down the rest of his dinner. Not that he had any other option.

"Cheer up, Kakashi," Minato says, as he sets the empty bowl back onto the tray. He picks it up, easing himself back to his feet. "You're still getting better. Getting out of the hospital doesn't mean you've stopped recovering."

In an all-too-familiar gesture, Kakashi turns away and closes his eyes to feign sleep.

* * *

He does manage to sleep for real, though. There's the sound of morning birds outside, so he must have spent the night. 

How shocking. This couldn't possibly have been Minato's plan all along.

It's odd, though.

He reaches out with his chakra and Minato's not there. The only other presence in the house, wild and malicious, is distinctly Kushina's.

He gets up, feet landing on the cold floorboards, sand realizes his cane is missing. Last he knew, he had stuffed it up his sleeve, but it's not there anymore.

He curses and reaches to grope over the nightstand, praying that Minato was just worried heed poke himself in his sleep and had removed it, and thankfully, it's there. He'd rather not use it indoors in a familiar space, so he loops the strap around his wrist and slides it back up his sleeve, out of the way but ready to be used at a moment's notice.

He's treating it like a weapon. The thought amuses him for some reason, but then it twists into something grotesque as he notices the obvious differences.

He likes weapons. He's good with them.

But the cane feels strange in his hand. Granted, everything’s been feeling strange lately, because his fingers won’t stop trembling so any sort of precise motor control is out of the question, but the cane especially so.

Long weapons had never been his forte, having primarily been trained with the short tanto and later the even shorter kunai, but he’s skilled and adaptable enough that he can pick up and use whatever’s in front of him, familiar or not. 

So why is this the exception? It should be easy. He’s had all the time in the world to learn it, and he’s actually gotten to  _ learn _ it — with an actual teacher giving him instructions and practice exercises, instead of guessing at a glance and being forced to perform immediately. There’s only so many ways he could feasibly use the cane, and he’s been explicitly shown the right ones. 

Anyways. It's not like dwelling on it will help. The therapist said that this was one of those things that you had to practice to get good at, which is what every adult says about everything, but he'll accept it because bashing his head at a problem until it solves itself is easier than using his brain and figuring out an actual solution.

Huh. That's not like him at all. He's always been the type to think through things before trying, and then analyse his mistakes to the point that he rarely failed more than once.

He shouldn’t be surprised, though. Everything’s been different lately.

If Minato can waver, and Rin can be disingenuous, then what’s to say he can’t be childish?

“Kakashi? Is that you?”

And he doesn’t even know what to think of Kushina anymore.

She’s never liked him much, preferring Obito for his energy and Rin for her kindness. She’s not quite cold towards him, he doesn’t think it’s possible for Kushina Uzumaki to be cold to anyone, but he’s always been aware of a marked difference in how she’s treated them. Add that with the weird half-assed antagonization in the hospital, and he’s lost.

“I have breakfast for you if you’re awake.”

Her voice is coming from the kitchen. He knows it’s just down the hall, so he shuffles towards it.

“Have a seat,” she says when he’s at what he assumes is the edge of the room. Her voice is accompanied by the scrape of a chair against the floor.

He uses that to locate where the chair is, and moves to find it, on hand reaching to find the back so that he can sit. 

“Piece of toast in front of you.” She’s definitely in the process of eating her own breakfast; she’s talking through a mouthful of something. “There’s a fried egg on top.”

“...Not ramen?” He sounds maybe more bewildered than he should, considering the point is that they’re not eating ramen for breakfast.

“Ramen isn’t exactly easy to eat y’know, so stop making fun of me when I’m trying to be nice. I didn’t even make ramen for dinner last night, and that’s when people normally eat ramen!”

Huh. Last night had been Kushina?

“Oh, Thank you.”

He picks up his toast and eating it goes fine. There’s probably crumbs everywhere, but there’s supposed to be crumbs everywhere after you eat toast, which is why there’s a plate to catch it all, so that’s okay.

“Thank you,” he says again when he’s done. “Um, where’s Minato-sensei?”

“Oh. He’s… Something came up.”

Her tone tells him not to ask, but he can’t help his curiosity. Minato hadn’t been acting strangely yesterday, had he?”

“Oh, okay then,” he says in lieu of his actual thoughts. “Would it be okay if I went home now?”

“Eh?” I dunno about that.”

He really can’t get a read on her at all. Apparently, she’s tired of doing the tough love thing all of a sudden.

“Minato will kill me if I let his star student get kidnapped walking home alone,” she lilts.

Nevermind. That would explain it.

“Buuut,” she continues, drawing it out like she’s annoying him on purpose, “if we did some training together, he’d never know. I won’t tell if you don’t.”

Against his will, his interest is piqued. 

He hears himself agree, then all of a sudden, he’s being dragged somewhere.

“These are my personal seals supplies,” Kushina says. “I don’t share them with just anyone, y’know! Be careful with them!”

“Kushina,” he says, trying to hide how his temper is spilling over, “I can’t  _ see _ . What do you want me to do with symbols  _ written in ink _ ?”

He can picture her crossing her arms in indignation, and he knows before she even speaks what she’s going to point out. 

“You're a ninja, you still have enough sense of where your body is to write without seeing it,” she says. “And, it’s ink, so you could touch it to check, since it’s wet and it still leaves a different texture when it dries. Anyways, I was gonna try and teach you to feel the chakra signatures of seals so you can use them without looking, but if you don’t want to, I can just lock you back into the guest room until Minato gets back.”

She interprets his silence an agreement to try, and takes his finger, tracing it along the symbols on a piece of parchment.

He really hates that, actually. Maybe it’s the loss of control, or maybe he’s just not used to physical contact (like that’s even a possibility when he’s been doing combat training since he could walk). It helps, that’s undeniable. He’d never figure out what was written on the parchment if Kushina didn’t show him the exact path of ink, and even then, he has to go over it several times before he manages to guess “Storage seal”.

The next one is “Explosive tag,” which he really only knows because it’s the second most common one, right next to the storage seal. She’s going easy on him. 

“Alright, that’s the easy part,” she says. “Now I’m going to give you the back of each one, and I want you to guess which it is based on the signature.”

It’s as hard as he expected it to be. He has his hand pressed against it, trying to identify the sparks of chakra coming off for minutes before he decides that it’s energetic enough to have to be something explosive.

“Exploding tag.”

“Nope! Exploding tags have a fire nature, you should feel the burn-y singe-y stuff if you try hard enough. If there’s no nature, and it feels weak, it’s almost definitely a storage seal, because those work solely off chakra but normally don’t take a lot of it. Most other seals with no nature transformation are really powerful stuff, so you'll rarely encounter them and you'll know it when you do."

They keep working, and Kushina keeps talking. It's sort of distracting, but he doesn't ignore her because it's interesting and more relevant than the exercise they're actually doing.

"I have an idea for a seal to help you," she explains. "It'll be sort of like an exploding tag, but it'll pulse a wave of chakra instead that'll latch onto other sources of chakra within range and put a radar on their locations."

"But if the people already emit chakra, I'll already know where they are. Everything else is the problem."

"It's still in development, y'know! Maybe we could get it to stick to everything, so trees and stuff would have a chakra presence so you could avoid them. I was thinking we could work on it together and design it to suit you. Your signature seals technique, like Minato's hiraishin and my chains."

He doesn't really believe it could work. A lot of feats done with fuinjutsu seem impossible before they're suddenly reality, but he's never heard of sticking chakra to things. Besides, the tags would have to be laden with it, and storing chakra is complex in its own right.

“How,” is all he says, though. 

“That’s what we’re going to figure out together, dummy! I’ll get Minato in on it when he comes home, and Rin is pretty good at seals too, so she can help! You don’t get signature jutsus by lazing around and not even trying, y’know. I’m just trying to get you to the point that you can start experimenting and doing things on your own right now.”

“I already have the chidori already,” he snaps. 

“It’s incomplete and you know it! You’re not allowed to use it for a reason.”

“It’s not,” he says tautly. Because it isn’t, not anymore. Ironically, enough, losing his sight had completed it, because he doesn’t have to worry about the tunnel vision anymore.

He’s not exactly happy about that, though. Tunnel vision is better than no vision. Even if there’s no longer a drawback, the state of his chidori is still worse than it was before.

That comment successfully kills the remains of Kushina’s enthusiasm.

Though, her determination is still alive and kicking.

She drills him for what seems like hours. He does make progress recognizing the chakra, finding himself to be fairly adept as soon as Kushina explained what to look for, but he’s still utterly inept at figuring out what symbols are written. He’s just about to give up when someone knocks on the door, saving him from having to argue with Kushina again.

“Auntie Kushina.” It’s Obito, sounding out of breath and more than a little panicked. “Is Kakashi here? He wasn’t at home.”

“He’s just inside,” Kushina says. “Ooh, are these Mikoto’s sweet buns? We just had breakfast a few hours ago, but maybe we could save them for later?”

“Uh. Sure.”

There’s the uneven three-step gait of Obito crutching into the house, and a crumple as he puts down what Kakashi guesses is a paper bag.

“Morning, Kakashi. Or afternoon.” It takes Obito a moment after finishing his perfectly normal, perfectly polite greeting for him to remember that he’s  _ Obito _ , and then he flies off the rails. “Bakakashi! Do you know how scared I was when I knocked and kept knocking and knocking and you weren’t there?”

“Why didn’t you just check for a chakra presence?” he mutters, but Obito plows right through him and keeps going full steam.

“And I knew you didn’t have physio today, so I had no idea where you could be, and I was super tired and it hurt a ton so I had to sit on the floor to rest, but then I fell trying to get up again, and you’re just lucky I thought to come here or I’d still be running around the village yelling for you.”

He should know by now that the best way to deal with Obito is to let him go until he burns himself out of fuel. Though, the thought that Obito had been screaming his name for any length of time is concerning.

“Whatever,” he says, deflating. “Um, do you want to work on hand signs again?” 

(Somewhere in the background, Kushina shouts something about how she already had dibs on working with Kakashi, but he ignores her.) 

“You’ve been getting really good at them, right? You’re like, better than me already.”

That’s not quite true. He can do most of the hand signs now, but not all. He’s more dexterous than he was when he first started, but he’s still slow. It takes him time to force his fingers into place, where those motions were once as fluid and effortless as breathing. So, yes, he can technically do them, they’re actually what he’s best at, both now and before, but it’s still nowhere near the level it should be at. It’s not even usable, not in a real combat situation.

Who’s he kidding. He’s not going to be fighting anyone anytime soon. What’s the point?

“I’m really tired,” he lies.

Obito, bless his soul, believes him, even though he has to know that Kakashi has only been awake for a couple hours at most. He doesn’t even sound downcast or disappointed in the slightest.

“Okay. I’ll take you to your room so you can sleep a bit, then.”

Obito leads him back to the guest room by the hand, which is annoying because he hates being taken care of, but it stops him from bumping into anything, which is less annoying. 

“I’ll be outside when you wake up, again, okay?”

* * *

As he lays there, in the darkness of noon, he hears something echo in his mind: “ _ What would I do to be strong again? _ ”

He regrets nothing. He regrets-

“A lot of things.”


	8. Obito

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for not updating for so long. Unfortunately, my schedule's been getting busier so I'll probably be going at around this pace from now on.

Obito had been visiting Kakashi every morning since he was released from the hospital. There were several functional purposes to it — to bring Kakashi food, to make sure Kakashi actually _ate_ that food, to bring him back to the hospital if he had physiotherapy scheduled that day. 

It wasn’t exactly easy, considering that he was still hopping around with leg braces and crutches himself, but he didn’t mind it. The only way to train his body back up to where it used to be was to actually train it, so a bit of pain and soreness was just par for the course. Besides, it gave him something worthwhile to occupy himself with during his medical leave, something to make him wake up every morning before the sun had started setting. He really shouldn't be the one complaining when he was the one who was going to be good as new in just a few weeks or months.

(Funny, because even though he was the one who could still use the changes in daylight to track time, it was Kakashi who was actually maintaining a half-decent schedule.)

Of course, Kakashi insisted that he could manage everything himself. Obito both believed and doubted that.

On one hand, he probably _could_ . Kakashi was the sort who seemed like he could do anything he wanted to. But then, _would_ he? Even before the… Even before, he had skipped meals whenever he could get away with it. Self-care wasn't exactly one of Kakashi's priorities, and Obito didn't expect that to change.

Besides, it didn't really matter if he wasn't useful. The core reason why he kept going was because he wanted to.

Minato would probably be delighted. The power of teamwork and all that.

Honestly though, he’s just happy to be friends.

Kakashi hasn’t been smiling at him or being nice or anything, but he also hasn’t kicked Obito out of his home yet, so he’ll take it as the other boy wanting to be friends as well. Low standards, but his bar’s been being pushed down for years now. He's going to treat Kakashi taking the tiptoe over it as a minor miracle, even if chances are that he stepped past it without even noticing it was there.

So, he'd like to think that it's understandable for him to panic a bit when he knocks on Kakashi's door and nobody answers. 

It's a little less understandable that he stood there and kept knocking for several minutes (basic pattern recognition, Kakashi would call it) but once he had finally figured out that nobody was coming, he had climbed around to the outside of the building, and found that the apartment was actually empty.

Huh. Who could've guessed. 

After that, he had rushed to Minato-sensei’s house, planning to ask for help, but it turned out that Kakashi was just there.

Another shocking revelation!

Anyways, that’s how he ended up sprawled on some mats doing sealswork with Kushina, because stupid Kakashi couldn’t be bothered to spend time with him after he had gone to all that trouble. 

It’s not really his fault, though. Kakashi's recovering and still tired, so he’ll be mature and be patient.

Which, unfortunately, is easier said than done when his hands are covered in ink and Kushina’s staring  daggers at him because he got her flooring dirty. And her walls. And her ceiling.

“Keep your wrist steady,” she orders.   
  
His wrist was steady. He’s pretty awful at calligraphy and especially at seals, where a single crooked line can make a harmless glyph blow up in your face, but he knows his wrist was steady there. She's just in a bad mood.

He’s not sure what he’d done to make her like this. Well, there’s the ink that’s ended up everywhere imaginable, but he basically does that every time he walks near paint and brushes, so that’s probably not it. She’s probably stressed and tired, with all the behind-the-scenes politics going on because Hiruzen wants to retire. She’s closely related to Minato, so she’s also under scrutiny. 

Whatever. He’ll just have to weather the storm for now.

“Done,” he says, drawing a stroke through the last character. “Can I do something else now?”

Kushina inspects it with an expression that clearly says he isn’t going to get a fair judgment.

“No,” she says, as was expected. “Your writing is a disaster.”

“Well, it usually works and I never even use fuuinjutsu anyways,” he protests. He’s been trying to be as nice as he possibly could be as of late, trying to make a change because his hotheadedness was what led to this disaster, but he can’t help the frustration from building. He doesn’t see red exactly but he’s definitely past the point of cool-headed thinking, so he continues, “I didn’t even come here for you, so stop making me do something stupid.”

“If you’d let me finish,” Kushina says scathingly.

Obito doesn’t see how she’s going to finish anything considering that her original statement was an open-and-shut insult.

“-I was going to tell you that I’m working on a seal to help Kakashi and I wanted to let you help, but if you don’t want to listen, I don’t care.”

He falls silent, glaring up at her in wait.

She takes her sweet time glaring back, happy to keep him in wait, before saying, “It’s not gonna make him see again or anything. If seals could work magic like that they’d already be being used. He’s gonna have to figure out pretty much everything again himself. But I thought there has to be something to, y’know. Make it easier.”

Okay. “What’ve you got?”

“Dunno, to be honest. I was thinking of turning chakra signatures into pulses he could use like a sonar, but he thought it was pretty stupid, and it kinda is. Said he’d still run into trees and stuff.”

Obito is thoroughly unimpressed. He’d actually been drawn in the moment she brought it up, but it’s half-assed at best. He wants to help but he’s provenly not good at seals, so it wouldn’t be the direction he went in if he had to work alone.

“So what’re you gonna do about it,” he says, deadpan.

Kushina gives him a look that promises certain pain in the near future. “If you’d stop being a little brat, I might be able to tell you. The problem is that I don’t actually know what issues he’ll have and what he’ll need, so I want you to go and test things out with him first. Y’know, a couple spars, some runs through the forest. Scope things out a little.”

For a moment, Obito is frozen in incredulity. He stares pointedly at his legs, his crutches, and then Kushina. “You want _me_ to do it? Why don’t you just go yourself? 

“I was trying to let you get involved!” she says. “And also, I think he’s mad at me right now. He’s not actually asleep, by the way.”

Oh. So that’s why she’s in a bad mood. He should’ve known that Kushina can’t be affected to things as subtle as politics and appearances. And Kakashi was just playing him, too. He doesn’t know why he goes to all this effort for them. 

“So you roped me in to do your dirty work.”

“Yup! Now do it.”

Obito sighs and staggers to Kakashi’s room, with the distinct feeling that he’s just been destroyed in a game of manipulation.

“Yo, Bakakashi,” he calls, knocking. “You wanna come out and make my life easier?”

He waits a moment. There’s no response.  
  
He knocks again, trying to ignore the sense of deja vu he’s getting. (At least this time, he probably won’t be climbing around the outside of a high building with his mobility severely limited. Granted, that was entirely his own decision and there were probably plenty of more reasonable solutions, but…) 

When there’s no response again, he tips forward, letting his forehead bang against the door. “Kakashiiii,” he whines, slamming his palms against the door too, and letting them slide down.

Slide down, over the doorknob.

And press down.

While he’s leaning against the door.

The door, which isn’t locked.

He tumbles in, screeching profanities before he hits the floor.

“Kakashi,” he shouts accusingly, scrabbling onto his hands and knees. “If you’d stop being such a jerk-”

Kakashi isn’t there.

Goddamnit. 

Whose house is he supposed to run to for help, now? Rin is probably not home since she’s actually working still, his own home is in the Uchiha complex which isn’t fond of letting outsiders in, and Minato’s house is where he already is. If he ends up finding him in Kakashi’s own apartment, he’s going to flip, no punches pulled.

His shinobi training kicks in and he scans the room. The only ways out are through the window and through the door. If he used the door, he’d have to have snuck past Kushina and himself in the hallway. Not a stretch, considering Kakashi’s skill, but there’s no way to get the front door open without making noise. There’s a bell hung from it for a reason. He’d still have to be in the house in that case, which Obito doubts, because he would’ve reacted to all the commotion. 

It has to be the window, then. It’s open to a slit, which would be perfect camouflage if Obito wasn’t already certain Kakashi had escaped through it. If it was closed all the way, it would be unlocked, which would point to it being closed from the outside. If it was open, it’d be so obvious someone had jumped out that some would think it was a decoy. This way is the most unassuming, not too deliberate in what it’s trying to hide. It just looks like a normal bedroom. 

If Obito hadn’t discovered the room was empty by falling into it and screaming his head off, he’d be wasting precious time scrambling around the house in his search for Kakashi right now.

As things are now, he only spends a moment staring in disbelief.

“Kushina!” he shouts, all conflict forgotten. “Come here, Kakashi’s gone, I dunno what happened!”

“What?!” she screams back, before she’s even there. “What do you mean ‘he’s gone’?!”

“I mean, he’s gone,” Obito says, unable to find any other words.

Kushina comes up beside him and takes in the scene. She looks at the neatly made bed, the crack of the window, and seems to come to the same realizations as him.

She seems to be even more alarmed, though. Her wild energy is reigned in in the span of a millisecond. “He can’t be far,” she says. “Go find Minato and tell him. I’ll look for him. 

What would Minato have to do with this? He should know even less than the two of them, if he’s been gone since the morning. Kushina’s tone tells him not to object, though, so he only asks, “Where is he?”

Kushina bites her lip. “I-I’m not too sure. Go to the Hokage Tower and see if he’s doing work there, if not, run by the missions desk to see if he’s out on a job. There’s nowhere else he’d be, I don’t think. Check out his usual haunts, I guess, if everything else fails. Don’t do anything that seems like it could be dangerous, though. Don’t go anywhere shady even if the trail points to it.”

The… Trail? What kind of crazy undercover operation is Minato even doing right now?

He nods shakily. He’d do a shunshin to get out, but he doesn’t trust himself to attempt one with how unsteady he is right now. 

Kushina doesn’t either, but she’s apparently come to the conclusion that the quickest way out was to copy Kakashi and jump out the window. He hesitates for a moment, wondering if he should do the same, before deciding that going all the way around to the front door is too much of a hassle and he clambers out after her. 

He turns to shut the window — all the way, because his primary purpose is to keep people out and not to make it inconspicuous — before running as fast as he could towards the tower. 

The tower isn’t that far away, really, closer than the distance between his and Kakashi’s homes that he walks without problem every morning, but for whatever reason, he’s out of breath by the time he’s halfway there. It’s too far. Every second feels like a second wasted, because he wants to go faster and he should be able to go faster, but he can’t.

It’s so much worse than it was when the same thing had happened in the morning. He had been worried then, a little scared, but he had been certain that things would be okay as soon as he found Minato. This time, with Kushina seeming terrified as well, and Minato likely being unavailable and possibly in danger, his head was spinning what-ifs. 

He wouldn’t even have been that frantic about it, but Kushina was, so something had to be going on behind the scenes. He wasn’t allowed to know about it even now, when there was an emergency. Maybe it was because they were in a rush, but he felt like Kushina could’ve told him more to help him in his search, at least.

“Minato-sensei,” he calls when he stumbles into the building. “Have you seen him today?”

The lady manning the reception desk looks up from her work. She looks a bit bewildered by how he’s flustered and heaving for breath. “Um, yes. He came by to talk to the Hokage early this morning, but he left hours ago.”

In between pants, he manages to gasp out, “How early?”

“Five or six,” she replies after some thought. ‘I had just arrived and was still getting set up. He didn’t say hello, either, so it must have been urgent.”

“Thanks. Did he say anything before he left?”

She frowns at him. “...Is there something you need?”

“No, just, answer me, fast,” Obito snaps. Everything is getting in his way. “Where was he going?”

“I don’t know. He was up there for twenty minutes then left without saying a word. If you’re not here for anything, get out before I throw you out.”

Well that took a turn. He’s probably made her mad, but he can’t be bothered to care. He doesn’t have time to; he’s out the door as soon as she finishes talking, and like his teacher, doesn’t say hello or goodbye. 

The next stop Kushina told him to go to was the missions desk, which thankfully, was right across from the tower. The people there were more familiar with him, too, and it was his academy teacher who greeted him with a wave, apparently blind to all of Obito’s body language.

“Hey, Obito. Good to see you back, it’s been a-”

“Not now,” he says. He needs these people to be cooperative enough to help him instead of kicking him out for being a nuisance. “Did Minato-sensei- er, Namikaze Minato sign in for any missions today?”

His teacher sees the urgency now. It takes a lot for Uchiha Obito of all people to be aware of timeliness, after all.

“Er, I don’t recall seeing him this morning, but I’ll look through the records just to be safe. Just give me a moment.”

He bounces from foot to foot as he waits, antsy despite his exhaustion. 

“...Nope, nothing today. I checked his personal file, too, and his last completed job was around a week ago, doing a solo patrol of the neighbouring forest region. You looking for him?”

“Yeah. Gotta run now, thank you for the help, Mister.”

“Good luck then, kid. Be careful with those legs of yours, alright?”

He sprints out without even acknowledging the comment. It was probably supposed to be helpful, even though it felt more like a jab, but every new bit of evidence is painting the picture darker, and it weighs heavy enough that he can’t be affected by a personal slight.

He walks, slow, to give himself time to recover. It doesn’t feel good, but he knows from experience that you get more mileage by resting and recovering stamina rather than just pressing the go button as soon as you can. 

Besides, it gives him time to think.

He’s absolutely sure that something bad is going on. Kushina’s in on it, and Minato is doing something related to it. It poses a danger to citizens in Konoha, or Kushina wouldn’t have panicked over Kakashi’s disappearance. It’s definitely taken over Minato’s work for the past week at least, judging by how long it’s been since he’s done an assigned job. Maybe longer, because the patrol was a C-rank, and could have been an empty job, or maybe even cover for needing to investigate there. He normally does an A-rank a day at least, when he’s on his own. It doesn’t make sense for him to skip out on so many work days without cause. He ran out of vacation days already, while looking after Kakashi and Obito in the hospital. 

Also, he was visiting the Hokage so early in the morning. He knows the Hokage and would talk to him without necessity, but never at such an odd hour. He’s probably trying to keep the fact that he was there at all quiet, or it was urgent and he needed to get it done as soon as possible.

None of that helps him, though. He doesn’t know about any sort of black market underworld in Konoha. It doesn’t even matter, because Kushina forbade him from doing anything risky. Honestly, he would just ignore her, but he isn’t even sure if anything like that exists, so he obviously doesn’t know how to access it.

What he really needs is a lead on where Minato could be. 

He’s already checked out the two most obvious places, and they turned up nothing — though, they were very telling nothings. 

He has no idea what Kushina meant by “usual haunts”. The only places that he knows Minato frequents are Ichiraku’s, and the training fields. They’re both stupid places to look, though. Minato only likes ramen because Kushina does and he likes to be near her, and the training fields are just flat patches of land with some markings painted on. Minato rarely train, and there’s nothing of note there.

Out of frustration, he starts pacing in circles, then curses himself for wasting time and energy.

But then, does it even matter? He has no idea where to go, anyways, and he’s not going to anytime soon unless he steps up with his deduction.

He does know where Kakashi might be, though. Honestly, that should’ve been his job. He’d be better at it than this, and Kushina would be better at finding Minato. She actually has some idea of what’s going on.

Honestly, he doubts Kushina is even going there at all. If she’s worried about something bad happening, she’s going to check all the places where that bad thing might happen, not the places that Kakashi would almost definitely be safe in. 

Back to Kakashi’s, then, at a steady trot that he estimates will wear him out around the time he reaches his destination. Slow and steady and all that.

He doesn’t even bother knocking this time. Pavlovian learning has taught him that that knocking only makes life difficult for himself.

He does try the doorknob, banking on it just being left unlocked like it had been earlier, but it’s not.

He’s not a ninja for nothing, though. If there’s a lock, he can pick it. Not really, but if there’s a basic, standard-use civilian lock, he can pick it. Kakashi definitely has wards in place everywhere inside, since this little security won’t cut it for him, but he’s been here enough times to know how to dodge those. 

It’s a good thing he has his bag with him. He’s supposed to always be well-equipped, and Minato had personally helped him create a list of items to keep stocked in his bag years ago. He stuck to it, too, first thinking of it as a chore, and then starting to find relaxation in taking and replenishing inventory. The issue was that he had a tendency to forget to bring the bag entirely. 

He didn’t today, though. An aftereffect of needing to carry food, but it meant that he had his picks with him. 

He grabbed a couple pins that he thought would work, and after a couple minutes of squinting into a keyhole, he jiggled the knob and the door swung open. 

Stepping inside (with caution to step on the tile closest to the door, then skipping the next two), he pushed the door shut behind him (touching only the handle). Nothing seemed out of place. It was a small place, just a living room, a kitchenette, a bathroom, and a bedroom. Neat and minimalistic to the point of being barren, as most things related to Kakashi were.

He pulled in his chakra, trying to minimize it, as he crossed the line between the entryway and the living room. There was only a sofa there, lonely against the wall, that Minato had gotten for Kakashi after he visited once and realized there wasn’t anywhere to sit. Nothing wrong there.

The fridge and pantry were empty, save for some standard stock items — A container of miso paste, some salt and sugar, cornstarch, flour — and leftovers from the dinner Obito had brought him last night. That was how it had been the last time Obito looked, too, and he doubted Kakashi would have bothered to restock since then. 

Bedroom next. 

The bed was made, which it should’ve been. Kakashi always made the bed, and he hadn’t even slept here last night. 

There’s the fluffy shuriken-patterned blanket that proved Kakashi was softer than he seemed, the photo of the four of them on the drawer that proved Kakashi did care, and the sword holster for his father’s tanto that proved… 

The tanto was missing. He knew it was supposed to be there, he had been the one to bring the broken shards to be repaired, and he had watched Kakashi put it back into the holder. Kakashi hadn’t brought it to Minato’s place. He rarely brought it anywhere, only using it in his most important missions.

Kakashi must have run away intentionally then, right? His apartment was laden with traps. An intruder wouldn’t be able to get in, take the sword, and get out without setting off at least one. No, Kakashi had voluntarily run away, came here, taken the tanto, and left. 

Through the door?

He looked up to the window.

It was open to just a crack, like before. 

Dumbass Kakashi. Everyone knew Kakashi always closed and locked all his windows before sleeping or leaving home. 

But, something else jumped out to him immediately. 

How the hell was Kakashi climbing around outside the sixth story of a building while blind and barely able to walk?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter will also be mostly plot, but there'll be a bit more character interaction fluff as well!


End file.
